CHRISTIAN 
UNITY. 
BY 
REV. 

MORGAN M. 
SHEEDY. 

BX 

1753 
.§5 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 



Shelf 

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 



CHRISTIAN UNITY 



- / 

REV. MORGAN M. SHEEDY 



"To what I now disclose be thy clear ken directed : and 

thou plainly shalt behold 
How much those blind have err'd who make themselves 
The guides of men," — Dante's Purgatorio, Canto xviii. 



W 161898! 




New York 
THE CATHOLIC BOOK EXCHANGE 
!2oWest6oth Street ' 



1895 



hi 



The Library 
op Congress 




WASHINGTON 



AUGUSTINUS F. HEWIT, S.T.D., 



xxv Jan. y 1896. 



Copyright, 1896, by "The Missionary Society of 
St. Paui, the Apostle in the State 
of New York." 



Printed at the Columbus Press, 120 West 60th St., New York. 



Ce?isor Depzctatus. 



•ffmprtmatur : 



MICHAEL AUGUSTINUS, 

Archiep. Neo Ebor. 



S>eMcation* 



TO ALL SINCERE LOVERS 

OF 

RELIGIOUS TRUTH, 

IN THE 

EARNEST HOPE 

THAT IT MAY PROVE 

SOMEWHAT HELPFUL 

TO THEM, 

THIS LITTLE WORK 

IS DEDICATED BY 

XLbc Butbor. 



CONTENTS. 



CHAPTER 

I. The Reunion of Christians, 


PAGE 
I 


II. 


The Need of Unity 


6 


III. 


Religious Unrest 




IV. 


False Principles 


17 


v. 


Falling Timbers 




VI. 


A Remarkable Fact 


26 


V 11. 


A Mere Historical Expression, . 


• 32 


VIII. 


The Church and Reason, . 


• 38 


IX. 


A Disintegrating Force, 


. 41 


X. 


How to Reach the Masses, 


• 46 


XI. 


Lazarus and his Rags, . 


• 54 


XII. 


The Evils of Divorce, 


• 63 


XIII. 


Some Startling Statistics, . 


. 69 


XIV. 


A " Fin de Siecle " Religion, . 


. 76 


XV. 


Some Strange Practices, 


. 80 


XVI. 


The Survival of the Fittest, 


. 85 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 



CHAPTER I. 

THE REUNION OF CHRISTIANS. 

In the remote antiquity of Egypt there 
was a legend that Osiris, the god of be- 
nevolence, was slain by Typhon, the god of 
hate, and his body hewn to pieces and 
scattered to the four winds. Isis, the wife 
of Osiris, from that time wandered every- 
where in search of the mangled remains, 
that she might put bone to bone and sinew 
to sinew, and thus restore to life the form 
that she loved. 

This story was widespread ; under one 
phase or another it was repeated in Persia 
and India ; it found its way into Greece 
and Rome ; and was accepted by the Scan- 
dinavian ancestors of the Anglo-Saxon race. 
The legend expressed the universal desire 
that torn humanity might be reunited. 
This, too, was the dream of the ancient 



2 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

philosophers. Three hundred years before 
the coming of Christ Zeno spoke of the 
fellow-citizenship of man, and said that the 
whole world ought to be one flock. Poets 
of all ages caught inspiration from the same 
idea, and have sung in fervid strains of the 
Brotherhood of Man. 

Christ, the Redeemer of mankind, came 
to realize this story of the heathen, this 
dreaming of poet and philosopher. He 
showed how, through the acceptance of His 
Gospel, the unity of the race could be 
secured. He taught the Fatherhood of God 
and the Brotherhood of Man. No more 
discord or separation among children of a 
common Father "who art in Heaven"; one 
heart here, one everlasting home beyond. 
And riven as is the mystical Body of 
Christ, each member is instinct with this 
common life ; each yearns to find the 
others, and cannot rest till bone shall come 
to bone, and flesh to flesh, and the beauti- 
ful Spouse of Christ shall be " fitly joined 
together and compacted by that which 
every joint supplied." 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 3 

To do this the Saviour of the world did 
not trust to argument or affection or con- 
tingency of any kind. By His divine power 
He decreed that UNITY should be the spe- 
cial mark or characteristic of His followers. 
The Holy Scripture does not speak of the 
unity of Christians as a thing of the future ; 
as something to be hoped for, but as an 
actual, present thing, an existing fact. 
" There is one body; there is one Faith; 
is ' There is one God and Father of all." 

In our day — and we thank Almighty 
God for it ! — there is a fuller understanding 
among Christians of the necessity of unity 
and its nature. The unity must be a visible 
unity ; a unity seen by the world, percepti- 
ble to men ; such a unity as will convince 
the unbeliever that He had a mission from 
His Father — " That the world may believe 
that Thou hast sent Me." Christ evidently 
meant, therefore, not merely the unity of 
Christian souls, but the unity of the Chris- 
tian body, or Church. The oneness of His 
people was not to be a hidden thing, 
known only in heaven, but an open sign 



4 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

and protest against the selfishness, strifes, 
and hatreds of the world ; a manifest proof 
that His disciples were under Divine Guidance. 

Proofs abound that we have entered 
upon an era of good feeling between Chris- 
tians. Everywhere it is recognized that the 
chief obstacle to the progress of the Gospel 
and the conversion of the world is the ex- 
istence of divisions among Christians. The 
desire for a reunion of Christendom is a 
striking characteristic of our times. Sepa- 
rated bodies of Christians are being drawn 
closer together. They cease to think ill of 
each other, and are uniting, wherever prac- 
ticable, in charitable and other good works. 
This is the first step towards that final and 
perfect union for which Christ prayed. 
And should no further advance be made in 
our day, every honest m»an is thankful for 
this better and more Christian feeling. Let 
us be done, then, with the gospel of hate — 
the impugning of motives, the unchristian 
denunciation, the bitterness of heart, the 
cruel annoyance and relentless persecution 
of former days. 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 5 

From many quarters are heard sweet 
sounds set to the music of heaven, that tell 
of the universal desire for unity and peace. 
That desire finds expression in the tone of 
the denominational press and pulpit ; in the 
action of various church bodies looking to 
Christian union ; in the earnest discussions 
of the subject carried on in conference and 
synod ; in the co-operation of Catholics and 
non-Catholics in temperance and charitable 
work ; in the cordial invitation extended 
from time to time by the heads of Protest- 
ant educational institutions to representative 
Catholic clergymen to explain some points 
of Catholic doctrine ; in the success of the 
Missions to non-Catholics conducted by the 
Paulist Fathers of New York ; but most 
notably in the friendly acceptance by the 
Protestant world of the exhortation of the 
Head of the Catholic Church for all Chris- 
tians to reunite. These are unmistakable 
signs that antagonism and strifes are pass- 
ing away and that we are rapidly approach- 
ing fraternity and love, based on true 
Christian unity. 



CHAPTER II. 



THE NEED OF UNITY. 

SHALL there be in our day, will there ever 
be, a reunion of Christians ? Until this 
takes place, the force and directness of the 
arguments in favor of Christianity are lost 
on some minds. There are too many who 
avail themselves of the divisions and dif- 
ferences that exist in the great Christian 
body to say that it is useless trying to 
find out where the Truth, as taught by the 
Divine Teacher, is. " Agree among your- 
selves," said the heathen to the missionaries 
who were competing for his conversion, " as 
to which is the true form of the Christian 
religion, and then you may come and teach 
it to us." A perfectly fair and just saying, 
from the heathen's stand-point. And not 
only does reason demand this unity as a 
proof of truth, but Holy Scripture sets it 
forth as a prominent sign by which the un- 
believer was to know that Christ was the 
Son of God. All through the New Tes- 

6 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 7 

tament runs this idea of the Unity of 
Christ's kingdom. St. John says : " There 
shall be one fold and one shepherd." The 
last prayer that the Divine Founder of our 
holy religion prayed on earth was a prayer 
for the unity of his followers : " O Father ! 
I pray that they all may be one, as Thou, 
Father, in Me, and I in Thee : that they 
also may be one in Us ; that the world may 
believe that Thou hast sent Me. And the 
glory which Thou hast given Me, I have 
given to them ; that they may be one, as We 
also are one. I in them, and Thou in Me : 
that they may be made perfect in one ; and 
that the world may know that Thou hast 
sent Me, and hast loved them, as Thou hast 
loved me" (St. John xvii. 21, 22, 23). 

In that last solemn hour, immediately 
before the awful scenes of Gethsemane and 
Calvary, and whilst the false disciple was 
bartering away His life, the thought that 
was uppermost in the mind of the In- 
carnate Son of God was the' unity of His 
people. And from the tremendous earnest- 
ness of the prayer, He evidently dreaded 



8 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

more the division of His mystical body 
— the Church — than He did the tearing 
asunder of His real body on the Cross. 

Where among the countless sects that 
the principles of the Protestant Reforma- 
tion have given birth to can a vestige of 
that unity for which the Master prayed be 
found? Instead of unity, there is endless 
division and unceasing strife ; sects warring 
against each other ; the empty cry of peace 
where there is no peace. And then there 
is the sceptic and the scoffer, the unbe- 
lieving world that was to be convinced by 
this luminous sign of Unity, sneeringly cry- 
ing aloud : " Look at those Christians ; see 
how they love one another ! " Every hon- 
est man recognizes the lasting injury and 
the weakness that the Christian religion 
suffers from the existence of sects. No 
one is more ready to admit and deplore 
this than modern Protestants. They very 
clearly perceive the want of unity, but 
seem entirely powerless in devising any 
means to bring it about. They see how 
strongly its absence tells against them in 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 9 

the judgment of the world, but they have 
no remedy. Here Protestantism is perfect- 
ly helpless. There is no centre of unity. 
No solid ground upon which the different 
bodies can securely rest. And hence, as 
far as Protestants are concerned, the dying 
prayer of the Son of God remains un- 
answered. 

It is recorded of the illustrious Father 
of his Country, Washington, that towards 
the close of his presidency he sent a fare- 
well message to his countrymen. Calling 
himself " their old friend and affectionate 
fellow-citizen/' he urged them to avoid dis- 
sensions, and thus make their union per- 
petual. These memorable words have been 
an inspiration to the Republic. Half a mil- 
lion lives have been sacrificed to make 
them good. But the last prayer of the 
Saviour of the human race is unheeded by 
those who call themselves His followers 
and who hope for salvation through His 
Precious Blood. He looked down from the 
Cross and saw the Roman soldiers parting 
His raiment ; He looked forward into our 



io CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

day and saw professing Christians for the 
last three hundred years rending His mys- 
tical body, the Church. 

It has long been foreseen that the ex- 
istence of a thousand different sects, with 
their varying creeds, means the destruction 
of what Christianity remains in the Protest- 
ant system. It can only be a question of 
time. And the sooner honest minds recog- 
nize this, the better will it be for the cause 
of religious truth and for that reunion of 
Christendom which is so much to be de- 
sired. Here it may be of interest to cite 
the words of Protestant leaders on this sub- 
ject of unity among Christ's followers. 
D'Aubign£, the historian, writes : " The re- 
union of Christians — that is the Reforma- 
tion of the nineteenth century." Bishop 
Whipple, the Protestant Episcopal bishop 
of Minnesota, says : " I believe our divi- 
sions are eating all faith out of the Ameri- 
can people." President Sturtevant, of Illi- 
nois College, speaks thus of the existence 
of sects : " I affirm with awe and trembling 
that while the church continues in her 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. u 

present divided and factious condition, she 
is a false witness to her Redeemer and 
Lord ; she fatally misrepresents His prin- 
ciples and His kingdom to the millions He 
died to save." Dr. Clarke, of Boston, fur- 
nishes the following evidence of the injury 
that is done the cause of Christianity 
through sectarianism. He writes : " In my 
judgment it is about time for truly Chris- 
tian people to begin to look this matter of 
sectarianism square in the face, as being 
morally wrong before God, and to cease to 
expect real Christian work without Christian 
unity y 

In the next chapter we shall review 
briefly the present condition of the religious 
world and the causes that have brought 
about the unrest everywhere visible. We 
shall also see how Christian unity was de- 
stroyed. 



CHAPTER III. 



RELIGIOUS UNREST. 

WHAT a distinguished political writer once 
said of France during its first Revolution, 
that "it had torn itself from the family of 
nations and become the antagonist of all," 
may be applied with equal force and truth 
to those Christian communities that em- 
braced the principles of the religious revolt 
of the sixteenth century. Three hundred 
years have been required to show fully 
" how much those blind have erred who 
make themselves the guides of men " in 
spiritual affairs. 

The present disturbances and bitter dis- 
sensions in the various denominations are 
logically due to the false principles laid 
down by the early reformers. The spirit 
of change and revision of creeds is every- 
where asserting itself. There is a strong 
demand for the adjustment of Protestant 
formulas so that they may be acceptable to 
those holding the most liberal views. 

12 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 13 

There is a rude battering down of ancient 
idols and landmarks that fills the minds 
of steady-going church people with alarm. 
And all this goes on ,in the name and in- 
terest of truth. History, science, and bibli- 
cal criticism are invoked to shatter not only 
forms of belief, but the very foundations 
themselves upon which that belief rests, 
There is a cry, which will soon make itself 
heard in many quarters, for a new reforma- 
tion. Men talk vaguely about and earnest- 
ly desire a reunion of Christendom. Some 
take to prophesying, and say that in fifty 
years from now, as far as the United 
States is concerned, the Catholic Church 
and infidelity will have absorbed all that is 
left of Protestantism. And in truth it looks 
as if this prophecy would be fulfilled. 

If this be the condition of the non- 
Catholic world to-day, it is obvious that the 
Reformation and its principles have helped 
to bring about this state of things. Look- 
ing backward one can easily trace, step by 
step, the origin, growth, and development 
of the almost innumerable divisions of 



14 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

Protestantism from the fundamental prin- 
ciple of private judgment so strongly laid 
down by the first reformers. Having re- 
jected the authority of the Church which 
was constituted by the Divine Founder of 
our religion " the pillar and ground of 
Truth," a mere fallible, since it was human, 
guidance was all that was left. Instead of 
Him, who was the Way and the Light, 
men were satisfied to follow their own 
ways and their own feeble lights; blind 
leaders of the blind, with such results as 
every honest Christian deplores. 

It was foretold by our divine Lord that 
scandals would exist in the Church. Her- 
esy and schism are justly counted among 
the greatest scandals. Hence one need not 
be surprised to find almost every age 
having its characteristic scandal. Heresies 
made their appearance in the very days of 
the Apostles and have continued down to 
the present time. All the early divisions in 
the Church were, however, trifling when 
compared with the great schism inaugurated 
by Martin Luther, the Augustinian monk. 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 15 

The single act of Luther in rejecting the 
divine authority of the Catholic Church 
rent Christendom in pieces. 

Up to the first quarter of the sixteenth 
century the unity and traditions of the 
Church remained unbroken. At that time 
began such a falling away from the one 
fold of the One Shepherd, the like of 
which the world before never witnessed. 
Then a movement began that aroused feel- 
ings of the most bitter and lasting hatred, 
which only the tolerance of our age has 
helped in a large measure to subdue. How 
far the scepticism, indifferentism, and ma- 
terialism of the present day are traceable 
to the false principles then put forth we 
shall notice later on. 

Martin Luther has been generally re- 
garded as the chief author and apostle 
of the doctrine of spiritual independence ; 
prior to the date, as everybody knows, that 
the fallen monk quitted his convent, leaving 
beads and breviary behind, him, and went 
forth to publicly renounce allegiance to the 
successor of the Fisherman, the Christian 



16 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

commonwealths of Europe were a unit in 
their faith. The creed which knit together 
the various races of Christendom was short 
and simple indeed. It was summed up in 
the words : " I believe in the One, Holy, 
Catholic and Apostolic Church." The foun- 
dations on which belief in this article of 
the creed rested seemed immovable ; the 
arguments in support of it were irresistible 
and well calculated to produce in sober 
minds a certainty approaching almost a 
scientific demonstration. Intelligent men 
reasoned thus: " Almighty God founded a 
Church, or He did not ; if He did, He was 
bound to preserve it, more especially if He 
promised to do so. That Church which 
comes down to us in an unbroken suc- 
cession from the Divine Founder and His 
Apostles, with every mark of its divine 
origin visibly stamped upon it, must un- 
doubtedly be the Church of God." From 
this line of reasoning there was not, nor 
can there be, any logical escape. 



CHAPTER IV. 

FALSE PRINCIPLES. 

The Catholic creed which the reformers 
assailed was associated in men's minds with 
all that was great and noble and worthy of 
admiration since the dawn of Christianity. 
It had the honors of more than a thousand 
years in the greater part of the world. 
" There was no other institution left," in 
the language of Macaulay, " which carried 
the mind back to the times when the 
smoke of sacrifice rose from the Pantheon, 
and when camelopards and tigers bounded 
in the Flavian amphitheatre. She [the 
Catholic Church] was great and respected 
before the Saxon had set foot on Britain ; 
before the Frank had crossed the Rhine ; 
when Grecian eloquence still flourished in 
Antioch ; when idols were still worshipped 
in the temple of Mecca." And the late 
Rev. Philip Schaff, the distinguished Pres- 
byterian historian, in a paper prepared 

some time ago for the General Conference 

17 



18 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

of the Evangelical Alliance, referring to the 
Church of to-day, writes : " She is still the 
largest body of Christendom, and nearly 
equals numerically the Greek and Evangeli- 
cal communions. She is the best organized 
body in the world, and 'the prisoner of the 
Vatican ' commands with infallible authority 
an army of priests and monks in five conti- 
nents. She is backed by inspiring memo- 
ries, as the Alma Mater of the middle ages, 
the Christianizer and civilizer of the North- 
ern and Western barbarians, the Church of 
the Fathers, the Schoolmen, and the Mys- 
tics ; the Church of St. Chrysostom and St. 
Augustine, of St. Benedict and St. Francis, 
of St. Bernard and St. Thomas Aquinas, 
of Tauler and Thomas a Kempis, of Pascal 
and Fenelon. She is still full of missionary 
zeal and devotion, and abounds in works of 
charity. She embraces millions of true wor- 
shippers and followers of Christ, and has 
the capacity for unbounded usefulness. We 
honor her for all she has done in the past, 
and wish her God's blessing for all the 
good she may do in the future. " 

At the time when Luther raised the 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 19 

standard of revolt her power and influence 
had been felt all over Europe. Every 
movement that aimed at promoting the 
welfare of the people was inspired and pro- 
moted by the Church. Learning, art, sci- 
ence, law, literature, and government were 
all deeply indebted to her. She was every- 
where justly regarded as the kind and 
gentle mother, having at all times a tender 
care of her children. She had her religious 
orders, her monastic establishments, her uni- 
versities, her world-wide relations all over 
the civilized globe. Such was her position 
and power at the outbreak of the Reformation. 

What an idle effort, one might say, for 
a recalcitrant priest to raise his voice in de- 
fiance of so powerful and widely established 
an authority? Luther did not stand alone. 
There were mighty agencies at work back 
of him which he could summon to his side 
once the conflict was fairly begun. Nor 
was the ex-monk slow to avail himself of 
every instrument within his' reach in his 
warfare against the Church. 

Among the agents that he found most 
ready to assist him were the petty princes 



20 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

of Germany, who were impatient to appro- 
priate to themselves the divine prerogatives 
of the Popes ; hungry nobles greedy to 
share the plunder of Catholic monasteries ; 
there were good men, doubtless, scandalized 
by the corruptions of the times ; bad men 
delighted at the idea of license always in- 
separable from great moral revolutions ; and 
above and beyond all there was that large 
class of persons who, in every age, soon 
grow tired of what is old and are always 
allured by the glitter of novelty. All these 
ranged themselves on the side of the new 
apostle. 

But the aid that the German reformer 
received from these sources, great as it was, 
seemed by comparison weak when con- 
trasted with the wonderful influence of the 
creed which he adopted. It was the boast 
of Luther and his associates that they 
would restore to their followers those spir- 
itual rights of which, they loudly pro- 
claimed, Rome had robbed them ; that they 
would restore that independence in ques- 
tions of faith and morals that had been 
wrested from them by the constant aggres- 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. i\ 

sions of an unlawful authority ; in a word, 
that man should enjoy henceforth the full- 
est Jiberty of mind and conscience, having 
cast off the restraints and limitations of the 
Catholic Church. The cardinal article of 
the new creed may then be stated in these 
words: "/ believe in mans infallibility." It 
was taught that man was his own master 
in spiritual things, " that he needed no out- 
side guidance/' that there was no consti- 
tuted authority, divine or human, to which 
he was in duty bound to submit. The cry 
soon became " Every man his own Bible" 
which plainly meant, every one his own 
church. And so, indeed, it has proved to 
be ever since among those who have ac- 
cepted the principles of the Reformation. 

Die Bibel ! — Babel. How aptly the cle- 
ver epigram of the German philosopher de- 
scribes the dissensions and confusion in the 
various Protestant bodies to-day? The Bi- 
ble interpreted by the private judgment of 
the individual — and this is the very first 
principle of Protestantism — produces only 
division and discord — Babel! 



.. CHAPTER V. 

FALLING TIMBERS. 

The first and fundamental article of the 
creed of the early reformers, as we have 
seen, was a profession of faith in man's 
infallibility. No authority outside of the 
individual himself was needed in spiritual 
affairs. It was readily assumed that each 
follower of the new teaching was entirely 
capable to interpret the Divine Mind. The 
Bible which the Catholic Church preserved 
with befitting reverence and love was, 
through the newly discovered art of print- 
ing, placed in the hands of the ignorant 
and wise alike. It was held to be the 
supreme guide and standard for all true 
Protestants in everything appertaining to 
faith and morals. 

This was a desperate plunge in the dark. 
It was made, as happens in like cases, with- 
out reflection, and only when too late was 
its dreadful absurdity perceived. Notwith- 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 23 

standing the obvious difficulties to the posi- 
tion maintained by the reformers, men's 
minds were so clouded by passion or zeal 
at the time that these difficulties scarcely 
presented themselves. Down almost to our 
own day the absurd principle of "private 
judgment" of the Bible has been stead- 
fastly maintained by Protestants. Why 
have they clung to this teaching in face of 
the contradictions and consequences which 
it involves? The reason seems to be found 
in man's innate pride and vanity. 

There is no compliment more quickly 
appreciated than that which is addressed to 
one's intellect. To tell even the most ig- 
norant person, that he is possessed of a 
plentiful supply of brains ; that he is capa- 
ble of doing any amount of thinking ; that 
he can solve difficult problems ; that he is 
equally gifted with his fellows in mental 
power ; that there is not, nor ought there 
be, any intermediary between the soul and 
its Creator, — are assertions freely accepted m 
as truisms by those to whom they are 
addressed. 



24 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 



" We shall be free. . . . 
Here we may reign secure; 
And in my choice, 
To reign is worth ambition." 

— Milton's Paradise Lost. 

It is really surprising with what tenacity 
this old Protestant tradition keeps its hold 
on the minds even of many intelligent, edu- 
cated men. Evidences of its falsity are 
constantly multiplying around them. Here, 
for instance, is the Churchman, the leading 
organ of the Episcopalians, writing of the 
remarkable changes that have been brought 
about in the faith of the various denomina- 
tions of Protestantism. It says : 

" The Thirty-nine Articles of the Church 
of England were never obligatory on the 
laity, and now they are not subscribed by 
the clergy of the Church that framed them. 
The Methodists are no longer rigid in their 
adherence to the modified form of the Ar- 
ticles which they adopted. The Congre- 
.gationalists have virtually abandoned the 
Savoy declaration and the Cambridge plat- 
form. The Continental Churches have all 



CHRISTIAN UNITY 25 

laid aside the formulas set forth at the Re- 
formation. Of the Presbyterian Churches, 
some have modified the terms of subscrip- 
tion to the Confession of Faith ; in others, 
the Confession has really been replaced by 
the teachings of dogmatic divines, and in 
this country the Confession itself is in pro- 
cess of revision/' 

It is evident, even to Protestants them- 
selves, that their religious systems are 
going to pieces. The " plough of disinte- 
gration " is cutting deep furrows through 
every Protestant sect. Their platforms of 
doctrine are breaking up. The spirit of in- 
dividualism, which has always been the con- 
trolling force of Protestantism, is asserting 
itself more and more, and it would seem 
as if any man with ordinary foresight must 
see that it is only a question of time for 
Protestantism to develop into agnosticism 
and infidelity. Yet, strange to say, they 
cling to the decaying platforms and falling 
timbers with a desperation worthy a better 
cause. 



CHAPTER VI. 



A REMARKABLE FACT. 

When we come to make a close study of 
the Reformation we shall find that it was 
nothing more or less than a test of man's 
fitness and ability to found a religion. 
Happily, that there might be no grounds 
for questioning man's power in this direc- 
tion, few serious obstacles were in the way. 
If difficulties did present themselves they 
were soon got rid of. There was from the 
beginning, especially in Germany, compara- 
tively a free and open field for the spread 
of the new gospel, and the march of Pro- 
testantism in the northern part of Europe 
was rapid and decisive. It secured a 
strong hold in Germany, Sweden, Norway, 
England, and Scotland. In these lands it 
may be said that the common people were 
robbed of the treasures cf their Catholic 
faith. The new forms of religion were lit- 
erally forced upon them by the strong 

hand of kings and princes who did not 
26 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 27 

scruple to have recourse to the most vio- 
lent force and persecution. The fair form 
of Catholicism was covered with humilia- 
tion and shame. Insults w r ere unsparingly 
heaped upon her. The name itself was 
made a by-word and reproach. Her priests 
and people were exiied and tortured. Cath- 
olic education was sternly prohibited. Re- 
ligious houses were suppressed and plun- 
dered. Churches and stately cathedrals 
w r ere desecrated or handed over to Pro- 
testants. Religious rites and duties, as un- 
derstood by the believers of the old creed, 
were interdicted by a stern code of penal 
laws. In short, Catholics were denied in 
those countries where the new teaching was 
established the last vestige of civil, relig- 
ious, and political rights. 

It need not, therefore, surprise any one 
familiar with the history of the means 
adopted to propagate the doctrines of the 
reformers to learn that their success was 
almost unbounded. In fifty years from the 
date when the apostate monk renounced 
allegiance to the Catholic Church " Protest- 



28 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

antism," in the language of Macaulay, 
" attained its highest ascendency." But he 
is careful to add "an ascendency which it 
soon lost, and which it has never regained." 

The writer whom we have just cited, in 
his essay on Ranked History of the Popes, 
though unable to deduce any general law 
from the facts which the history of Pro- 
testantism presents, says : " We think it 
a most remarkable fact that no Christian 
nation which did not adopt the principles 
of the Reformation before the end of the 
sixteenth century should ever have adopted 
them. Catholic communities have, since 
that time, become infidel and become Cath- 
olic again, but none has become Pro- 
testant. " 

The " remarkable fact " referred to by 
the Protestant critic tells heavily against 
the soundness of the principles of the re- 
formers. After the heat and passions that 
were aroused at the outbreak of the revolt 
had somewhat subsided men began to see 
more clearly the nature of the issues in- 
volved. When the pause came there was 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. * 29 

an opportunity to weigh principles and 
measure the results likely to follow from 
the new doctrines. Intelligent minds quick- 
ly rejected the absurd assumption of the 
reformed creed which vested the individual 
with infallibility in the formation of his re- 
ligious belief. The very idea was beyond 
reason. It was sure to result in religious 
anarchy. Again, it was not difficult to un- 
derstand the ridiculous position that Pro- 
testants occupied in holding that the Bible, 
and it alone, was the rule of faith and 
conduct. Put the sacred volume into the 
hands of the individual, read it without 
note or comment, not to speak of a living 
interpreter, and the road to salvation was 
secure. It required only a short time to 
open the mind to the many contradictory 
views and opinions that must necessarily 
arise from the principle of private interpre- 
tation of the Scriptures. These views were 
soon formulated into articles of belief and 
became standards for new sects that multi- 
plied on all sides. One need not, there- 
fore, wonder or regard it as " a most re- 



30 CHRISTIAN UNITY, 

markable fact" that before the end of the 
sixteenth century there was not found a 
single Christian nation prepared to accept 
the new gospel. By that time its false 
doctrines were everywhere understood and 
rejected. A reaction set in towards infi- 
delity and revolution in the seventeenth 
and eighteenth centuries, and towards Ra- 
tionalism and Catholicity in the nineteenth. 

Even in the life-time of the reformers 
this reactionary feeling made itself felt. It 
showed itself in the formation of innumera- 
ble sects in Germany and England, and 
their offshoots in the United States and 
Canada. The existence of these almost 
countless sects, and the alarming confusion 
that at present prevails in the Protestant 
world with regard to the primary doctrines 
of Christianity, can be easily traced. The 
one and the other are plainly due to the 
principle of " private judgment," which is a 
principle of destruction. It is this principle 
that gives a logical standing to such men 
as Rev. Charles Briggs in the Presbyterian 
body, Rev. Dr. Bridgman in the Baptist, 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 31 

and the Rev. Heber Newton in the Epis- 
copal denomination. On this principle they 
can afford to laugh at heresy trials and re- 
buke their sect for its intolerance. "If it is 
heresy," writes Rev. Dr. Briggs, "to say 
that rationalists like Martineau have found 
God in the reason, and Roman Catholics 
like Newman have found God in the 
Church, I rejoice in such heresy ; and I do 
not hesitate to say that I have less doubt 
of the salvation of Martineau or Newman 
than I have of the modern Pharisees who 
would exclude such noble men, so pure, so 
good, the ornaments of Great Britain and 
the prophets of the age, from the kingdom 
of God." Men's eyes are at last opened 
and they begin to see more clearly that the 
first principles were false to reason, false to 
the express teaching of the Divine Founder 
of Christianity, and consequently that the 
very foundation of Protestantism was a 
foundation of sand. 



CHAPTER VII. 



A MERE HISTORICAL EXPRESSION. 

It will be agreed, I think, by all who take 
the trouble to investigate the subject, that 
the world to-day is divided between two 
great forces or movements. There is, as 
Cardinal Manning observes, on the one 
side the One, Holy Catholic Church with 
its Divine authority, its Divine laws, and its 
Divine obligations spreading itself through- 
out the world and permeating all nations j 
and there is on the other side a society 
which is in the darkness of midnight, the 
deadly antagonist of the Church. These 
are the two great forces that are pitted 
against each other. They are necessarily 
hostile to each other. An unceasing war 
exists between them. And the result is 
watched with engrossing interest by widely 
different and differing classes of persons. 

Protestantism is not in the field. In the 
language of a brilliant writer of the present 

day ; " is now but a mere historical expres- 
32 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 33 

sion; it is no longer one of the competing 
creeds, any more than Judaism is, or Arian- 
ism. Amongst the religious movements 
that claim the future of the world it has 
no place. " And again : " Protestantism has 
not, nor ever had, anything that Catholi- 
cism has not got in far larger measure, and 
it has deliberately rejected very much of 
value that Catholicism has. Every Protest- 
ant hero, or book, or achievement could 
be easily matched by ten better from the 
Catholic record. " 

This same writer goes on to say, what 
every intelligent man must clearly perceive, 
that it is necessary to be a Protestant, 
actually to believe in the Protestant doc- 
trines, in order to see anything at all valu- 
able in Protestantism. A pure Materialist 
will have to admit that the Catholic Church 
has had a great place in the story of civil- 
ization. But the moment one abandons the 
creed of Protestantism it seems to have no 
claims, no arguments, hardly any history, 
certainly no future. It is nothing more 
than the servile worship of a Book gro- 



34 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

tesquely strained in interpretation. Read 
the book, like any other book, it is de- 
manded, and Protestantism becomes a 
shapeless pile of commentaries on the He- 
brew literature. It is neither a church, nor 
a creed, nor a religion. Such is the ac- 
count that Frederick Harrison, the English 
Positivist, gives of Protestantism. It is an 
account calculated to alarm still more those 
who have yet some hope in the future of 
Protestantism. What is specially impressive 
and singular about Mr. Harrison's view, 
and of others who have said the same 
things, is this, that it comes to us from 
men who but yesterday were the friends 
and champions of that system of religion 
which they now so vigorously assail. They 
speak almost with contempt and ridicule 
of the so-called Reformation and its mod- 
ern developments. And, strange to say, 
they are themselves the legitimate children 
of the sixteenth-century reformers. They 
are men, for the most part, of high intelli- 
gence, fearless and independent, who do 
not hesitate, no matter what offence may 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 35 

be given by the act, to press principles to 
their logical and necessary conclusions. 

However strongly one may be inclined 
to agree with the estimate of modern Pro- 
testant thought as furnished by this class, 
we are not prepared to accept it unless the 
proofs are forthcoming. What are the 
facts in the case ? Is there a great theo- 
logical change taking place in the Protest- 
ant mind of our day ? And what will be 
the result of this religious revolution? Will 
it bring men nearer to the Catholic Church, 
or drive them in large numbers into the 
ranks of scepticism and infidelity? What is 
the meaning of the upheaval that is going 
on in the Protestant world ? What ex- 
planation can be given of the glaring fact 
that this religious revolution which rages so 
fiercely in the various Protestant bodies is 
entirely unfelt by the Catholic Church ? 
Surely, there must be a reason for this. 
What is the reason? 

No student of current events need be 
told that there is a veritable revolution go- 
ing on before our eyes in the Protestant 



36 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

churches. We are told that the remaining 
years of the century are to be years of 
fierce theological strife. Professor Briggs 
tells us that the present " theological re- 
form can no more be resisted than the 
flood of a great river"; that the "century 
will close before the conclusion of the pres- 
ent movement" for the revision of the 
Westminster Confession of Faith can be 
reached. From the discussions that have 
taken place on this subject of revision it 
is learned that the great body of Pres- 
byterians of this day have been formally 
professing doctrines which are really shock- 
ing and hateful to them. We find an old 
and stanch Presbyterian elder, a man of 
great intelligence, who confesses his igno- 
rance of the articles of his faith concerning 
election, predestination, infant and heathen 
damnation, and the horror which these 
doctrines excited in him when they were 
brought to his attention. The late Presi- 
dent McCosh, of Princeton, says that since 
the publication and discussion of those ter- 
rible articles, young men intending to pre- 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 37 

pare themselves for the Presbyterian min- 
istry have halted or actually turned back, 
horrified by the .doctrines to . which they 
would be called upon to give their ad- 
hesion. Yet the whole system of Pres- 
byterian theology, of all orthodox Protest- 
ant theology, rests on those doctrines now 
so heartily detested by a very large num- 
ber of the Presbyterians. Those repudiated 
teachings have been the very essence of 
Calvinism and the faith of Presbyterianism. 
Take away the doctrine of election and 
foreordination and the whole system goes 
to pieces. That body and the various 
other bodies that hold with it to the Cal- 
vinistic doctrines are left without chart, 
compass, or rudder. 



CHAPTER VIII. 



THE CHURCH AND REASON. 

In the Episcopalian and Congregationalist 
bodies heresy, as tested by the old stand- 
ards, is prevalent, Throughout the entire 
Protestant world a radical change of doc- 
trinal views has taken place during our 
generation. The tendency seems to be to- 
wards future probation or practical Uni- 
versalism, if it is not toward downright 
agnosticism or the entire abandonment of 
supernaturalism. The early reformers would 
find it rather difficult to recognize their 
latter-day descendants, so great has been 
the doctrinal change. To-day we find Pro- 
testants, like Rev. Dr. Briggs, looking to 
the Church and Reason, as well as to the 
Bible, as sources of divine truth. " The 
only authority to which man can yield im- 
plicit obedience," he declares, is " divine 
authority " ; and the fountain of that is not 
in the Bible alone, but also in the " Church 

and the Reason." What would happen to 

38 



CHRISTIAN UNITY, 39 

a Presbyterian professor who should have 
the hardihood to proclaim such teaching 
twenty-five years ago we leave to our read- 
ers to conjecture. What would good Pro- 
testants of the past generation think of the 
following statements coming from a learned 
Presbyterian scholar : " Protestant Chris- 
tianity bases its life and faith on the divine 
authority contained in the Scriptures, and 
too often deprecates the Church and the 
Reason ? " And again : " The majority of 
Christians from the Apostolic age have 
found God through the Church." 

In the Episcopal Church, and in some 
other Protestant bodies, the doctrine of 
Purgatory, or of an intermediate state, is 
openly advocated. At the last General 
Convention of the Episcopalians resolutions 
looking toward prayer for the dead, whose 
use can be justified only on the acceptance 
of purgatory, were defeated by a very 
small majority. Nor is belief in these doc- 
trines confined to any one of the parties in 
that Church. Low churchmen and Broad 
churchmen joined with the most advanced 



40 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

High churchmen in supporting the resolu- 
tions that embodied the teaching. 

The Congregationalists are divided on 
the doctrine of future probation as applied 
to the heathen who have had no oppor- 
tunity to accept Christ. Many of them 
either absolutely reject or doubt profoundly 
the doctrine of damnation as taught by Cal- 
vin and the old doctors of Puritan theology. 

Thus, in the various Protestant Churches 
there is a great theological revolution going 
on in our day. Religious belief and senti- 
ment are undergoing a very radical transfor- 
mation. A new era in Protestant thought 
has begun whose characteristic aim seems to 
be to knock away the pillars of its ancient 
belief and to substitute reason for faith. 

What causes have brought about these 
radical changes in the Protestant mind ? 
What explanation is there for the preva- 
lence of the sceptical and agnostic spirit 
among Protestants, which is rarely, if at all, 
found among Catholic Christians ? These 
questions are easily answered and the an- 
swer should satisfy the most exacting mind. 



CHAPTER IX. 



A DISINTEGRATING FORCE. 

Already it has been noted that the funda- 
mental principle of Protestantism is a prin- 
ciple of division and destruction, not only 
in the matter of creed, but in that of faith 
itself. Its history is the clearest proof of 
this. Divisions and sects began in the life- 
time of the reformers. Luther, Calvin, 
Melanchthon, Zwingle, and others held 
widely different views on the fundamental 
doctrines of Christianity. The result was 
seen in their day, just as in our own, in 
the establishment of opposing divisions and 
churches. Before the death of the arch- 
reformer, in Germany alone, not to speak 
of the divisions elsewhere, there were as 
many as twenty-eight different creeds or 
formularies of faith. From that day down 
to the present the number has gone on in- 
creasing to such an extent that it is a diffi- 
41 



42 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

cult task to reckon them all. The spirit of 
Protestantism is revolutionary and destruc- 
tive. Its first principles lead directly to 
rationalism and infidelity. The process 
may be slow, but the results are certain. 
Lecky, the historian, observes that "the 
corner-stone of Protestantism is an admira- 
ble one for a temple of Free Thought, and 
for nothing else." Dr. Philip Schaff, a 
leading Presbyterian scholar, in a letter 
read before the Evangelical Alliance held 
in Italy a few years ago, refers to the ten- 
dency of Protestantism towards scepticism 
and infidelity. " Protestantism," he writes, 
" is by no means perfect in any of its 
forms. It has its defects, and is liable, by 
the abuse of individualism, to run into 
sectarian division, rationalism, scepticism, 
and agnosticism." And many other in- 
stances could be cited in which attention is 
called to the " danger of the centrifugal 
tendency of Protestantism to excessive in- 
dividualism and division." 

We can, therefore, put our finger on the 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 43 

prime cause of the theological revolution 
that is raging in the different Protestant 
churches. History confirms, what reason 
proves conclusively, that Protestantism is a 
disintegrating force and that the principle 
of private judgment leads logically to in- 
fidelity. And it is because intelligent minds 
in the various denominations to-day are be- 
coming convinced of this, and are, more- 
over, alarmed by the growth and spread of 
Rationalism and unbelief among the Pro- 
testant masses, that we conclude a great 
transformation must inevitably take place. 
Already men are speculating on the out- 
come. The question is asked, Will the 
present movement for a new reformation 
result in bringing back to the Mother 
Church any considerable number of our 
separated brethren, or will it help to re- 
move them farther still from the Unity of 
Faith and the bonds of Peace ? 

It is hard to say. This much, however, 
is certain, that the deepest and strongest 
tendency of our age is not toward- division, 



44 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

but toward reunion. The old prejudices 
against the Church are rapidly dying out. 
The Pope is no longer referred to in the 
Confession of Faith as " Anti-Christ." The 
civil loyalty of Catholics is unquestioned. 
There is no strife or discord over funda- 
mental doctrines of belief among the mil- 
lions who acknowledge the supremacy of 
St. Peter as vested in Leo XIII. The 
Catholic Church gives supreme authority to 
the truths of revelation. And whilst Pro- 
testants boast of an open Bible it is well to 
remember that they owe it to the Catholic 
Church that they have a Bible at all ; and, 
furthermore, that they may soon stand in 
sore need of the Catholic Church to defend 
and preserve the Bible — the Protestant 
Bible — from being torn in fragments by 
Protestant critics. In view of all this we 
are not surprised to hear a strong cry for 
the reunion of Christendom. " There must 
and will be one flock and one Shepherd, 
as sure as Christ who promised it is 
the truth ! " exclaims a Protestant leader. 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 45 

" There are many," writes another, " who, 
while they are not willing at present to ac- 
cept the teaching of Rome with regard to 
the infallibility of the Pope, or the doctrine 
of Transubstantiation, will eventually be 
glad to find a home in a Church which 
holds to the religion of supernatural revela- 
tion, and does not deny the inspiration of 
Holy Scripture nor put in jeopardy the 
! words of Christ." 



CHAPTER X. 



HOW TO REACH THE MASSES. 

Every one is familiar with the query, 
which involves a most difficult problem, so 
often propounded in the meetings and con- 
ferences of Protestant ministers : " How are 
we to reach the masses ? What means 
should we employ to bring the vast non- 
church-going body within the influence of 
the Gospel?" Or the question takes this 
form : ■" Why is it," asks the despondent 
Protestant preacher, " that with our splen- 
did churches, eloquent ministers, attractive 
music, and large outlay of money there are 
not increased spiritual results ? " The answ r er 
comes from a prominent clergyman of wide 
observation, who writes : " We have mag- 
nificent church machinery in this country, 
we have costly music, we have great Sun- 
day-schools, and yet within the last twenty- 
five years" (he is referring to the Protestant 

bodies) " the churches of God in this land 

4 6 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 47 

have averaged less than two conversions a 
year each. There has been an average of 
four or five deaths a year in the churches. 
How soon/' he inquires, " at that rate will 
this world be brought to God ? We gain 
two ; we lose four. What will this come 
to? I tell you," he exclaims, "that while 
here and there a regiment of the Christian 
soldiery is advancing, the church is falling 
back and rapidly losing ground ! " 

Need any sane person wonder, when 
confronted with evidence of this kind, that 
the injury to divine faith must be very 
great, that the number of sceptics and un- 
believers is increasing everywhere ? If, at 
this moment, there is a rapid decline of 
religious belief among the Protestant masses 
of the population, and this has been going 
on for the last twenty-five years, what is 
the cause of this decadence ? The Rev. 
Mr. Junor, of the Dutch Reformed Church 
of New York City, estimates that the popu- 
lation of the metropolis is thus divided with 
respect to religion : 



48 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

Roman Catholics, - 762,666 
Church-going Protestants, - - 258,666 
Non-church-going Protestants, - 253,333 

Heathen, 3 2 5>335 

And this proportionate estimate would 
hold for our other large cities, Boston, 
Philadelphia, St. Louis, Chicago, and San 
Francisco. There is, then, a great falling- 
off in Protestant church-going. Dissension 
and doubt have made heavy inroads, on 
the Protestant faith. " The only Christian 
communion," observes the New York Sun, 
commenting on these figures, " upon which 
modern scepticism seems to make no im- 
pression is the Roman Catholic." The ex- 
planation, then, is obvious. In the Catholic 
Church there is unity. In the Protestant 
body there is, and ever must be, divisions 
and sects. And sects St. Paul pronounces 
things accursed, classing them among the 
works of the flesh that are condemned. Go 
into any town or village of the United 
States, and you will find on close inquiry 
that the existence of rival sects has more 
to do with the decay of Protestantism than 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 49 

all other causes combined. There is no 
place so poor in wealth or numbers as not 
to be able to set up two or three different 
church organizations, each, from the very 
fact of its being, setting forth the claim that 
it alone is the surest and safest way to sal- 
vation. The Protestant bishop Coxe tells 
how he visited a little village in Western 
New York where he found five spires point- 
ing heavenward. There was no resident 
minister in the place just because of the 
five different sects. Each of the five 
church buildings w r as amply large enough to 
accommodate the entire church-going popu- 
lation. The bishop inquired what the peo- 
ple of the place believed in, what sort of 
religion they professed. This was the an- 
swer : " Many believed in spirit-rapping; 
others ran round to hear lectures on one 
subject or another, and heard a preacher 
now and again who told them funny stories 
and made them laugh at some of the truths 
of the Gospel." The amiable bishop on 
hearing this is reported to have used the 
following language : " If this be the result 
of your Protestantism, the land is the 



50 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

devil's already/' Nor is the bishop's ex- 
perience exceptional. Some time ago the 
writer read an interesting report prepared 
by two Methodist ministers of what they 
had witnessed in certain districts of the 
West. One of these gentlemen made the 
statement that he found in an Illinois vil- 
lage, among a population of not more than 
eight hundred souls, nine different Protestant 
sects! "Why," said the other, " that is 
nothing; I have just returned from a rural 
district in the same State where I found 
among seventeen families sixteen different 
forms of religions belief ! " And so it is all 
over the land. The many divisions and 
sub-divisions of Protestantism are every- 
where visible and constantly increasing. 
From time to time attempts have been 
made to bring about a union of the differ- 
ent divisions of the same denomination, but 
in almost every instance the effort has 
proved unsuccessful. It is needless to refer 
to particular cases. 

From this notorious lack of unity among 
professing Christians there arises the con- 
viction in many minds, that there must be 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 51 

something radically defective in a religious 
system that creates such a medley of war- 
ring elements and conflicting creeds. And 
the result is a loss of faith and Christian 
knowledge. The masses are indifferent or 
entirely outside the reach and influence of 
Protestant teachers. Protestant churches 
are half-empty. Many of them are aban- 
doned altogether, or devoted to purposes 
other than those for which they were origi- 
nally designed. Some time ago the Phila- 
delphia Times startled many of its readers 
by showing by actual count that twelve 
Catholic churches had more worshippers 
on Sunday than seventy-six Protestant 
churches ; the figures being for the twelve 
Catholic churches 49,178 ; for the seventy- 
six Protestant churches 24,007, less than 
one-half. In the West things are, if pos- 
sible, even worse. Protestant ministers and 
church organs w r arn their people that unless 
there is a better church attendance some of 
the costly Protestant edifices of the large 
cities will have to be handed over to 
the Catholics, whose churches are always 
crowded, or be abandoned to the owls, the 



52 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

bats, and the bitterns. The attendance at 
Protestant services largely depends on the 
" drawing " powers of the preacher. If the 
preacher is a sensationalist he is certain to 
have a large-sized audience until some one 
more sensational still comes along, or his 
hearers grow tired of his efforts. The 
most widely-known preachers of the day 
are those who cultivate this quality of sen- 
sational preaching. And the sensationalist, 
like Mr. Sam Jones, Mr. Small, or the boy 
revivalist, is in constant demand. Crowds 
flock to hear any of these gentlemen when 
they preach, and we read of the large num- 
ber of obdurate sinners converted by their 
preaching. And yet how strange is their 
method of treating the truths of the Gospel, 
how flippant and shockingly irreverent are 
some of their sayings ! 

There is another class of Protestant min- 
isters who have done much to weaken, if 
not destroy altogether, the faith of their 
hearers. Who are they ? They are preach- 
ers who are secret or avowed sceptics. 
And they are much more common than is 
generally supposed. We only hear of the 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 53 

few who are brought into prominence, like 
the Rev. Dr. Briggs, Rev. Mr. McQueary, 
or Rev. Heber Newton, by heresy trials. 
But these gentlemen and their supporters 
tell us that there are many other ministers 
in their respective denominations who hold 
the same views as they do. What is, in- 
deed, strange and to be deplored is, that 
congregations stand by and applaud teach- 
' ers who broach the most flat-footed infidel- 
ity. These preachers are actually praised 
for having, as it is called, the courage of 
their convictions. Men who have openly 
denied the fundamental doctrines of the 
Christian religion, the divinity of Christ, the 
inspiration of the Bible, the Fall of man, 
the nature and extent of the Atonement, 
are nevertheless regarded as safe religious 
guides ! Instead of receiving letters of dis- 
missal they secure the warmest approbation 
of their people, an increase of salary, and 
more crowded audiences. There is scarcely 
a city in the country that does not fur- 
nish conclusive proof of this painful fact. 



CHAPTER XI. 



LAZARUS AND HIS RAGS. 

If there were nothing else to find fault 
with in the history of Protestantism, the 
fact that it has made little provision for 
the spiritual wants of the poor would alone 
be sufficient to condemn it. The divine 
Founder of Christianity lovingly called the 
poor " His own." And the Catholic Church 
has always regarded God's poor as her 
most precious inheritance. She, the spouse 
of Christ, has been taunted with Seing the 
Church of the poor and lowly, but she 
glories in being thus reproached. It is one 
of the marks of her Divinity. 

What has Protestantism done for the 
spiritual needs of the poor? Some person 
has said that the Master's words, "The 
poor you shall have always with you," may 
well be erased from the Protestant Bible. 
They have no practical meaning. A wall 
of separation is built up between the rich 
and the poor in Protestant churches ; at 

54 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 55 

the very threshold is erected an insuper- 
able barrier which the humble and poorly- 
clad worshippers can never hope to cross. 
Some of the foremost churches of the land, 
according to the testimony of Protestants 
themselves, have been converted into club- 
houses where the wealthy and fashionable 
meet with an interesting and high-toned 
minister, where such can be had, as the 
' central figure to hold what may not im- 
properly be described as a mutual admira- 
tion gathering. 

"The whole fabric of American Protest- 
antism, " says a writer, not a Catholic, in the 
North American Rcviczv for February, 1886, 
M is inwrought with the notion that class 
distinctions must exist, must be intensified 
in houses it erects to the worship of a Di- 
vine Being who is supposed to care nothing 
for such distinctions and whose Son, when 
on earth, consorted with fishermen and the 
' lower classes ' generally in preference to 
the company of ' nice people.' " Honorable 
exceptions are found without doubt, here 
and there; but the great stubborn fact 



56 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

remains that American Prot stantism does 
foster an exclusive, aristocratic spirit. The 
poor man, Lazarus, is made to feel that his 
rags are out of keeping in so fine a place, 
and he is assured that he will feel much 
more at home in the new mission-house 
which the church is so good as to build for 
him. " Say what we may," continues this 
writer, " the Protestant church has no place 
for the poor man within its pale. The 
wealthy churches snub him till he betakes 
himself to the unfashionable ones, or omits 
to go to church altogether ; and the churches 
which lay no claim to being fashionable 
are yet not over-gracious to the very poor 
worshippers, who ought to be satisfied with 
the religious cold victuals proffered his kind 
at the mission chapel. It would not be 
pleasant to find a ragged, dirty stranger in 
our cushioned pew next Sunday. He would 
certainly be out of place there. Away 
with you, Lazarus, to the mission chapel 
where you belong ! And so Lazarus is 
sent around to Protestantism's back door, 
the mission chapel ; and Dives leans back 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 57 

in his pew and listens graciously when the 
clergyman admonishes him never to turn 
his face away from any poor man, in order 
that the face of the Lord may never be 
turned away from him." 

Is it any wonder that Lazarus, his soul 
filled with the scornful reproof of the 
wealthy and the despitefulness of the 
proud, sometimes fails to perceive the great 
kindness extended to him, and either turns 
from religion entirely or enters the Church 
that makes him in his rags as welcome as 
the sinner that dines sumptuously every 
day ? Every sincere Christian must thank 
God that there is a Church where all 
worldly distinctions must be left outside the 
door ; where the equality of man is fully 
acknowledged in the presence of the Crea- 
tor ; within whose sanctuary the wearer of 
" the gay clothing and he of the tattered 
sleeve " stand on an equal footing ; where 
the equality of man is not a mere theory 
to talk about, but a great practical truth 
deeply recognized and frequently inculcated. 

And in works of charity, what a striking 



58 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

contrast there is in the histories of the 
Catholic and the Protestant Churches ? 
How barren the one and how fruitful is the 
other in this class of Christian work? It is 
a glorious record, that which tells of the 
tender charity of the Catholic Church in all 
ages, in every land, and among all classes 
of the weak and helpless portion of the 
race. There is nothing to compare with it 
in the world's history. Outside of the 
Catholic Church there is found in Christian 
countries a feeble imitation in the philan- 
thropic work that is carried on by individ- 
uals and societies of her magnificent tri- 
umphs of charity. It has not escaped the 
notice of those who have examined the his- 
tory of the organized charities of the 
Catholic Church how there runs through it 
all the same striking sympathy and com- 
passion of the Divine Physician for poor, 
suffering humanity. There is the spirit of 
patience, of kindness, of self-sacrifice, of 
generosity, of humility, of unselfishness, of 
sincerity ; which St. Paul says are the true 
elements or ingredients of Christian Love. 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 59 

And whilst she follows the rule, to a cer- 
tain extent, that "charity begins at home," 
by giving her first thought and care to her 
own children, in truth she knows no creed 
or class in her work o f oeneficence. Her 
charity is as broad and universal as the 
Church itself. 

The Church has not left to individuals 
or to changing circumstances the relief of 
the poor and suffering. No; she has from 
the very beginning, with singular wisdom 
and foresight, organized permanent institu- 
tions of charity. And the world has been 
quick to recognize the necessity and extent 
of her work of beneficence. Men are at- 
tracted to her by that admirable system of 
organized charity which she has established 
everywhere. The abandoned child of sin, 
the old man tottering to the grave, the 
leper deformed and mutilated by disease, 
the profligate woman, the beggar on the 
street, the man stricken by fever or the 
plague, the wounded soldier on the battle- 
field, the orphan child, the news-boy and 
the shoeblack, — each and all are the objects 



60 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

of her solicitude and charity. For each 
class she has built nurseries, asylums, hos- 
pitals, and refuges. She has blessed and 
set apart in the numerous sisterhoods and 
brotherhoods devoted and heroic souls to 
minister to suffering humanity. Thus is she 
ever repeating the miracle of her Divine 
Founder when He said : " I have compas- 
sion on the multitude ; for, behold, they 
have been with me three days and have 
nothing to eat." 

Let me name some of those splendid 
institutions of charity with whose workings 
all of us are more or less familiar. There 
are the Sisters of Charity and Mercy, 
whose well-managed hospitals and orphan 
asylums are to be found in all our towns 
and cities. There are the " Little Sisters 
of the Poor," whose heroic charity chal- 
lenges the admiration of the scoffer and the 
sceptic. Only fifty years old, this institute 
has houses, not alone in Europe and 
America but in distant India, China, and 
Australia. There are at present upwards of 
270 houses of this community, 39 of which 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. . 61 

are in the United States and Canada. 
Within the last half-century these Sisters 
have taken care of over 100,000 helpless old 
people, more than 80,000 of whom died 
while in their care. There are the Sisters 
of the Good Shepherd, who are extending 
shelter and protection to over 30,000 un- 
fortunate women and girls. There are the 
daughters of the ascetic St. Francis and of 
the glorious St. Dominic, who are ever 
ready to face danger, and even death, in 
the cause of charity. In the leper colony 
of the Sandwich Islands members of the 
former community are to-day ministering to 
the unhappy victims of that most loathsome 
disease, leprosy. A sacrifice more heroic 
than this is hard to conceive ; for on enter- 
ing the leper island those noble women 
may truthfully apply to themselves the 
words of Dante : " You who enter here 
leave hope behind. " There is no hope of 
life in this region of death. There is the 
world-wide work of the society of St. Vin- 
cent de Paul, which is an organized charity 
of Catholic laymen with its eight or nine 



62 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

thousand conferences. The members of this 
society labor in the cause of charity with- 
out the pay or praise of the world. There 
is the Association of the Holy Childhood, 
which has been so warmly commended by 
Leo XIII., and which has administered 
baptism within the last fifty years to up- 
wards of 1,200,000 children of heathen 
parents. There is the magnificent work of 
a single priest, Father Drumgoole, in New 
York City, who has made good and useful 
citizens of thousands of homeless boys. 
And so we might go on to enumerate 
many others. 

Where is there in the history of Protest- 
antism anything to compare with this ? 
" Poverty/' said Buddha, " is the curse of 
Brahma." Mahomet declared that God 
smote the wicked with misery. Paganism, 
ancient and modern, regards it almost as a 
disgrace. What estimate Protestantism has 
put on the words of Christ, " What you do 
for the least of them you have done to 
me," may be fairly judged from its history. 
Look up the record. 



CHAPTER XII. 



THE EVILS OF DIVORCE. 

The next feature in the history of the so- 
called Reformation that shows its down- 
ward tendency is the great injury it has 
wrought in society by its institution and 
s'anction of divorce. The first divorce 
record of modern times was that granted 
by Martin Luther himself to the profligate 
Philip, Landgrave of Hesse. In England 
that " beast of a king/' as he has been 
properly styled, Henry VIII., left the 
Catholic Church and took forcibly, by 
threats and persecutions and bribes, the 
greater part of the nation with him, simply 
because the Pope would not, since he could 
not, grant him a divorce from his law- 
fully wedded wife, Catharine. Thus Pro- 
testantism began in Germany and England 
by violent assault on the sacred and indis- 
soluble character of marriage. And from 

the day that this business of divorce was 
63 



64 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

introduced into our modern society, the 
number of. divorces in non-Catholic com- 
munities has gone on increasing with such 
alarming rapidity that it now exercises a 
most harmful and pernicious influence upon 
public morality. So hurtful and evil is the 
effect of free-and-easy divorce, that conser- 
vative Protestants are themselves crying out 
against it. 

And no wonder, since most people agree 
that the family is the unit or foundation of 
society. Where the family tie is secure ; 
where family life is pure and safely 
guarded ; where the rights and relations of 
the different members of the family circle 
are duly observed ; and especially where the 
solemn engagement entered into by hus- 
band and wife is religiously maintained, — 
there one may reasonably look to find 
peace, harmony, and happiness reigning su- 
preme. But, on the other hand, wherever 
laxity prevails ; wherever marriage is re- 
garded merely as a civil contract, to be 
broken at the will or caprice of one or 
other of the parties ; wherever the modern 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 65 

institution of unlimited divorce finds ac- 
ceptance, and is generally practised, — there 
society is sure to be in a disturbed and 
sickly condition. A blow aimed at the 
family by destroying the divine institution 
of matrimony, is a blow directed against 
the peace and well-being of society and 
government. If the family be destroyed, 
society is left without a sure foundation to 
rest on. How few realize that this must be 
the case ? Rulers and legislators might 
occupy themselves with profit in devising 
means to put a stop to the alarming in- 
crease in the number of divorces in those 
countries where the institution is sanctioned 
by civil law. 

Ignoring the divine law and the teaching 
of experience, the plea is made that di- 
vorce instead of being hurtful is rather a 
benefit to society, and therefore should be 
permitted on the score of private or public 
good. But in answer to this argument, 
which certainly ought to find no favor with 
those who profess to follow the law of the 
Gospel, it is enough to say that statistics 



66 CHRISTIAN UNITY, 

prove that freedom of divorce is not a 
safety-valve, but, on the contrary, that it 
exercises a decidedly harmful effect upon 
public morality. 

What has been the outcome of this di- 
vorce legislation ? Professor Frank Sargent 
Hoffman compares the statistics for 1886, 
the latest year for which full data are at- 
tainable. He examines the total number of 
divorces granted in the several countries of 
Europe, and in the United States. He 
finds that the number of divorces granted 
in Ireland (among Protestants, of course) 
was 7 ; in England and Wales, 372 ; in Rus- 
sia, 1,196; in France, 6,211; and in the 
United States the number has reached the 
frightful dimensions of 25,535 ' The last- 
named figure shows an increase of 157 per 
cent, from the 9,937 divorces recorded in 
1867, and Professor Hoffman believes that 
a conservative estimate would place the 
number of divorces allowed in the United 
States during the year 1893, among Prot- 
estants, whites alone, at upwards of 35,000 ! 
The aggregate number of divorces obtained 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 67 

in all the States of the Union in the 
•twenty years, 1867-1886, was 328,716; of 
which 139,382 put asunder couples having 
children, whose lives and interests were ma- 
terially affected thereby. 

It is certain that freedom of divorce 
does not tend to promote morality or to 
diminish the number of illegitimate births. 
Professor Hoffman agrees with the highest 
legal authorities in saying that " the desire 
to be rid of a relation that has ceased to 
be pleasant leads many a man, and not a 
few women, to conduct either intended to 
bring about that result, or recklessly en- 
tered upon in the feeling that, if such a re- 
sult takes place, it will not be unwelcome/' 
Statistics show that where divorces are 
most numerous, there illegitimate births are 
most frequent. According to Mulhall, the 
percentage of illegitimate to total births is 
1.6 in Greece ; in Ireland, 2.3, and in Rus- 
sia, 3.1. In Spain, Portugal, and Italy, the 
average is 6.1 ; while in France, Germany, 
Scotland, Sweden, Denmark, and the 
United States, it varies from 7 to 11.2. 



68 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

Professor Hoffman believes that while 
separation from bed and board should be 
granted for certain causes, he holds, and 
this as the result of his careful investigation 
of statistics, that the evils resulting from 
the freedom of absolute divorce can only 
be remedied by the general adoption of the 
rule making the marriage bond indissoluble ; 
that is to say, by an acceptance of the 
Gospel law as interpreted and enforced by 
the Catholic Church. We can see no indi- 
cations, however, that Protestants are pre- 
pared to check the growth of the evils of 
divorce by returning to the Catholic teach- 
ing and practice. On the contrary, there is 
observed a greater toleration of divorces in 
what is called society than ever before. 
Protestantism offers but a feeble resistance 
to the baser passions of mankind. Hence 
its toleration of divorce. 



CHAPTER XIII. 
SOME STARTLING STATISTICS. 

We have seen in the previous chapter that 
within the last ten or fifteen years the 
number of divorces yearly obtained in the 
United States has steadily increased. We 
have also seen that at present the old 
prejudice against divorce, founded on Chris- 
tian principles and teaching, has very large- 
ly disappeared among non-Catholics. People 
marry and are divorced for incompatibility 
or because matrimony did not turn out so 
happily as they expected, and yet they suf- 
fer little or not at all in social estimation, 
even when they make new matrimonial 
ventures. There is much outcry among 
certain bodies .of Protestants against our 
civil divorce laws as dangerous to the insti- 
tution of marriage, but it is not rare to find 
members of some of the churches denounc- 
ing these lax laws who are prepared to 
6 9 



;o CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

take advantage of them to escape from 
marriages, and they do not find it difficult 
to get ministers of their own or other com- 
munions to marry them again. Nor are 
they or their ministers subjected to any 
ecclesiastical punishment in consequence. 
Notwithstanding some agitation against the 
laxity of divorce, the multiplication of the 
grounds for divorce is the rule under 
American civil law. It prevails throughout 
the Union with few exceptions among the 
States. 

Whilst complete returns of the number 
of divorces yearly granted are not easily 
secured, there is evidence only too strong 
to show that there is an alarming growth 
of the divorce evil. Let us look at the 
record of New England in this matter. 
What do we find? In the year 1878, and 
the number has increased in the interven- 
ing years, the ratio of divorces to marriages 
in the land of the Puritans was as follows : 
Massachusetts had in that year 1 divorce to 
every 15 marriages; Vermont, 1 to every 
13; Rhode Island, 1 to every 9; Connecti- 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 71 

cut, I to every 8. This is an alarming 
record. Now, if we turn to the record of 
another section of the country, to the 
Western Reserve of Ohio, originally settled 
by New-Englanders, we find even a worse 
state of things. The ratio of divorces to 
marriages in this portion of Ohio is double 
that of the rest of the State, whilst Lake 
County, the most Yankee in its original 
settlement, shows a rate of 1 divorce to 
every 6 marriages. 

Some years ago Judge Lord, of Massa- 
chusetts, received as high as thirty applica- 
tions for divorces in two days from couples 
none of whom had been married more than 
three years. With indignation the judge at 
last exclaimed, as the petitions came rush- 
ing in upon him : " I am here to administer 
the laws as I find them, but God help the 
land giving such appalling evidences of 
prostitution." 

This divorce business is now managed 
with such skill and brought -to such a de- 
gree of perfection by cunning and un- 
scrupulous lawyers, that a man may retire 



72 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

to rest at night a married man and awake 
in the morning to find himself single, his 
better-half having in the meantime secured 
the necessary documents. 

A special marriage service also has been 
arranged for the convenience and protection 
of the Protestant minister who is called 
upon to officiate in the case of divorced 
persons. Here it is : 

" The persons to be married anew to 
second partners being present, with suitable 
witnesses, it is well that the minister should 
briefly exhort them to the effect that 
marriage is a serious business, and yet not 
so very serious after all ; and should en- 
courage them to be of good cheer, be- 
cause mistakes are easily corrected. After 
which he may read from Hosea i. 2, 
'Go, take unto thee a wife/ etc.; and iii. 
1-3, ' Go yet, love a woman beloved of 
her friend/ etc. Then he will, do well to 
omit the customary invitation to any pres- 
ent to show a ' just cause or impediment/ 
and proceed at once to require of the 
bridegroom to show good reason why he 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 73 

has a right to be married, notwithstanding 
he has a wife living." 

Then let the man answer thus, or to this 
effect : 

" Here are the papers, all fresh and regu- 
lar, from the Court of County, Indiana. 

Cause, incompatibility of temper, and the 
assurance of Messrs. Quirk, Gammon and 
Snap that they have been procured prompt- 
ly and without publicity." 

And the woman shall answer thus, or to 
the like effect : 

"Oh! I'm all right. Divorce from the 
Superior Court of Connecticut, Chief-Justice 

presiding. Cause, conduct tending to 

defeat the object of the marriage relation. " 

Then let the minister say : 

" Who giveth the indemnity bond to the 
minister to secure him, in case there should 
be any trouble arising out of this little 
affair?" 

And this question having been answered 
satisfactorily then and there, by the execu- 
tion of a good and sufficient bond, let the 



74 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

persons take each other by the hand, and 
let the minister say to the bridegroom, call- 
ing him by his name : 

"You, , take this woman to be more 

or less your lawful wife, and you promise 
to render to her the duties that society 
expects of you in this relation, until some 
incompatibility of temper arises, or until 
the present arrangement is regularly dis- 
solved by the divorce courts. Thus you 
promise ; though if you don't choose to 
keep your word, I do not see what in the 
world is going to be done about it. ,, 

Answer: " With this understanding, I do." 

Then let the minister say to the bride : 

" You, , take this man to be, in a 

certain sense of the word, your lawful hus- 
band ; and you promise, having taken all 
necessary precautions to secure your prop- 
erty in your own right, to show a due 
respect to' the conventionalities of society, 
until incompatibility or divorce shall part 
you. Thus you promise." 

Answer : " It strikes me as safe to do so." 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 75 

" I pronounce you, therefore, in the 
sense in which the words are used in the 
statute, to be husband and wife. And since 
your being joined together is in distinct 
contravention of the law of God, there 
seems to be no obvious reason why man 
should not put you asunder at his own 
discretion. " 

Prayer and benediction being hardly ap* 
propriate on such an occasion, the services 
may be concluded by the payment of a fee. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

A "FIN DE SIECLE" RELIGION. 

RITUALISM — this is the latest and, at pres- 
ent, the most fashionable phase of Protest- 
antism. It is also the most wayward and 
ungrateful child in the large family of Pro- 
testant sects, since it is continually vilifying 
and saying ugly things of its parent. For 
instance, such elegant phrases as the follow- 
ing have been spoken by modern Ritual- 
ists : " The first Reformers were a pack of 
unredeemed villains" ; which they undoubt- 
edly were, though our separated brethren 
were a long time in making the discovery. 
Better late than never to find the truth 
about those " heroes" of the Reformation. 
Again, speaking of the great religious re- 
volt of the sixteenth century, some of our 
Ritualist brethren sum up their estimate of 
the whole business in this blunt fashion : 
" Their boasted Reformatioit zvas a miserable 
apostasy." Beyond question it was truly 

this, and worse, as the Christian world has 

76 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 77 

found to its cost during the last three hun- 
dred years. 

Some of our readers would, doubtless, 
wish to know what Ritualism is ? It is a 
form or sect of Protestantism that is 
ashamed of its birth, that cultivates with 
passi/ig success ceremonial grace and beauty 
in its services, that makes much use of 
ecclesiastical millinery, and caters largely to 
the aesthetic taste of the fin de Steele Pro- 
testant. It is, indeed, a charming thing to 
look at, like a handsome and beautifully 
dressed baby ; but it will not stand expo- 
sure, and therefore has to be daintily nursed 
and handled. A religious " blizzard " would 
be sure to crush out its frail life. It bears 
externally so close a resemblance in many 
respects to our Catholic form of worship 
that a distinguished clergyman on being 
asked what precisely was the difference be- 
tween Ritualism and Catholicity replied : 
" The chief difference that I see is this: 
the one has the Papacy, the other the 
Apeacy." Rather clever, if not too compli- 
mentary. 

With that class of religionists who are 



78 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

always sure to follow the most fashionable 
form of Churchism, Ritualism is likely to 
become, for a time at least, quite an at- 
traction in this country, as it has been in 
England. 

There are certain circles in the religious 
life of Americans where it is considered 
vulgar to be a Protestant ; a {Roman) Catho- 
lic is considered, and perhaps we should 
thank God for it, a tolerable kind of per- 
son, provided he or she happens to be cul- 
tured and wealthy ; but a Ritualist or, as 
they prefer to call themselves, a " Catholic," 
without the word Roman or Anglican, is 
just the thing. Ritualist ministers would be 
shocked — they are very easily shocked, in- 
deed — on hearing themselves called " preach- 
ers." They despise that term. They in- 
variably speak of themselves as " priests " ; 
some of them go so far as to style them- 
selves, and wish others to do so, " Fathers." 
In their churches they use crosses and the 
crucifix, candles and incense, vestments, 
stations of the cross, and " all the other 
trumpery," as it used to be called, " of the 
Papacy." They are continually blessing 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 79 

themselves — some of them, it is reported on 
excellent authority, with the left hand as 
well as with the right ; a mistake, by the 
way, often made by children and those who 
are just beginning to learn the rudiments of 
religious practices. Then again, and this 
could be set down in the list of latter-day 
miracles which it would puzzle one of our 
advanced modern scientists to explain, many 
of them have introduced the confessional 
into their churches. Who ever would have 
dreamed of such an innovation as this ? 
Auricular confession, inculcated and prac- 
tised by Protestants — for such the Ritualists 
are, no matter how strongly they may pro- 
test against the use of the word as applied 
to them — after three centuries of the most 
constant, wanton, and blasphemous abuse of 
that divine institution ! Now at last the 
light has come in upon them that this 
" powerful engine of priestcraft" may be, 
after all, from God. Surely when those 
things occur under our very- eyes we can- 
not help crying out in utter amazement — 
wonderful age this I 



CHAPTER XV. 



SOME STRANGE PRACTICES. 

THOUGH the confessional has been intro- 
duced into Episcopalian churches and the 
practice of auricular confession urged by a 
certain class of its ministers, the number of 
confessions heard by those Ritualistic con- 
fessors is said not to be very great. Some- 
how or other it is rather difficult to make 
the greatest devotee of Ritualism under- 
stand the utility of this means of grace and 
spiritual consolation. It is told by one of 
our Catholic missionaries how a certain 
Protestant woman came to him one day 
and expressed a desire " to go to confes- 
sion. " From her manner the good priest 
had serious doubts about her Catholicity. 
And he said to her : " Madam, are you a 
Catholic ? " " No, sir," she answered, " I am 
an Episcopalian. " " Well, then," said the 
missionary father, " why not go to confes- 
sion to your own minister ? " " Oh ! " she 
80 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 81 

replied, entirely satisfied with the force of 
the answer, "/ cant bring myself to do that 
since lie is a married man" Many of the 
Ritualistic " Fathers/' it may be observed, 
have not advanced so far as to accept the 
discipline of celibacy. All of them, we 
hope, will get to that later on. 

At one of the recent General Conven- 
tions of the Episcopalians the following 
resolution was introduced : 

" Resolved, That the Committee on Litur- 
gical Revision be instructed to add to the 
office for the burial of the dead some suit- 
able prayer commending the departed soul 
to its Creator and Saviour." 

Of course such a resolution meant the in- 
troduction of prayers for the dead, and the 
adoption of a custom and the sanction of 
a doctrine against which Protestants have 
vehemently protested for the last three 
centuries. It implied belief, if not in the 
Catholic doctrine of purgatory, at least in 
the theory of future probation, in oppo- 
sition to the old Protestant teaching that 
the dead are beyond the reach of prayer, 
and that their spiritual and eternal state 



82 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

has been determined. Yet this resolution 
only failed of passage by five votes out 
of two hundred and thirty in all ! 

The subject was brought up later on 
in this same General Convention of the 
Episcopalians in the form of a commenda- 
tory prayer for a person at the point of 
death, thus framed : 

" Into thy hands, O merciful Saviour, 
we commend the soul of Thy servant, now 
departing from the body. Acknowledge, 
we humbly beseech Thee, a sheep of 
Thine own fold, a lamb of Thine own 
flock, a . sinner of Thine own redeeming. 
Receive him into the arms of Thy mercy, 
into the blessed rest of everlasting peace, 
and at the last into the glorious estate 
of Thy chosen saints in heaven. O most 
merciful Jesus, none can perish whom 
Thou takest into Thy charge. Receive, we 
beseech Thee, Thy servant's soul in peace. 
Amen." 

That also was construed, and rightly con- 
strued, as sanctioning the principle of 
prayers for the dead, and accordingly there 
was a heated discussion over the proposed 
prayer. From this it is evident that the 
" dread of Romish tendencies" is rapidly 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 83 

passing away and that eventually, if not in 
the near future, prayers for the dead will 
become, like so many other Catholic prac- 
tices, a part of the Episcopal liturgy. 

It will be simply a return to the spirit 
of the liturgy of Edward VI., so grateful to 
the Ritualistic party, and which included in 
the burial service this supplication : 

" Grant unto this Thy servant that the 
sins which he committed in this world be 
not imputed unto him, but that he, escap- 
ing the gates of hell and eternal darkness, 
may ever dwell in the region of light, with 
Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, in the place 
where there is no weeping, sorrow, nor 
heaviness ; and when that dreadful day of 
the general resurrection shall come make 
him to rise also with the just and righteous, 
and receive this body again to glory, then 
made pure and incorruptible." 

This prayer was afterwards changed, with a 
view to avoiding praying for the dead, but 
we now see that a strong body, not only 
of English but American Episcopalians, are 
anxious to return to the old Catholic prac- 
tice, which existed in the Church long be- 
fore the time of Edward VI. 

Nor are Episcopalians alone among 



84 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

Protestants in abandoning opposition to 
prayers for the dead. The Congregational 
Board is assailed because it makes the sug- 
gestion of future probation a disqualifica- 
tion for its service, though such belief 
makes consistent, if not essential, prayer 
for the dead. There have been Congrega- 
tional ministers of late years who were not 
at all frightened by this logical result from 
their teachings. 

A wonderful transformation, we see, has 
been going on in Protestant belief and 
practice. And it is a hopeful sign that the 
trend is, with a large and earnest body 
of believers, towards the Church of our 
Fathers. 



CHAPTER XVI. 



THE SURVIVAL OF THE FITTEST. 

WHILST there is on the one side a marked 
tendency towards unity with the Catholic 
Church — and that is chiefly noticeable among 
the High-Church or Ritualist party of the 
Episcopalian body — there is, on the other 
hand, among American Protestants a widely- 
spread spirit of scepticism or unbelief. And 
this latter tendency is in the direction of 
the grosser forms of materialism and sensu- 
alism. Those who closely scan the daily 
doings of our social life are justly alarmed 
by its ugly revelations. The drift seems to 
be downward, to a lower and more sensual 
mode of living, rather than upward to a 
higher and purer life. Incidents in our 
modern society are of such frequent occur- 
rence as to strike a truly Christian soul 
with horror and shame. So much so that 

one is reminded of that loathsome condition 

85 



86 CHRISTIAN UNITY. 

of English society to which the poet re- 
ferred when he wrote : 

" Religion, blushing, veils her sacred fires, 
And unawares morality expires ; 
Nor public flame, nor private dares to shine, 
Nor human spark is left, nor glimpse divine." 

Nor would it be difficult to trace the 
growth of modern scepticism and that spirit 
of social unrest which threatens the peace 
of the world to the principles of the six- 
teenth-century revolt. 

The conclusion that has been reached by 
those who have studied the question, and 
its truth is confirmed by a multitude of 
facts so obvious that no one seriously dis- 
putes them, is this : that the great moral 
upheaval, known as the Protestant Reforma- 
tion, which at one time threatened to 
engulf, if it were possible, the Church of 
God, has spent its force. Its moral and 
social influence is rapidly passing away. 
Its flattering creed, the fruitful parent of 
many heresies, is discarded ; all that was 
false and fanatical in its early history is 
well-nigh eliminated j and there is to-day a 



CHRISTIAN UNITY. 87 

better, because a more Catholic spirit, 
among its professed adherents. 

To be sure, the Reformation wrought 
much mischief in the world for the last 
three centuries, nor has society witnessed 
the last evil fruits of its teaching. It 
opened wide the flood-gates of irreligion, 
and revived scores of exploded heresies to 
run anew their pernicious careers ; it at- 
tacked the very foundations of faith and 
morals by substituting the fantastic notions 
of man for the wisdom of God as declared 
through His appointed oracles. However, 
though it has done all this, because of the 
abiding promises of the divine Founder of 
Christianity the vital doctrines of religion 
have not suffered, as no truth can perma- 
nently suffer from being submitted to the 
crucial inquest of doubt. The cross has 
vindicated its dignity as the noblest of 
spiritual symbols ; and its increasing ascen- 
dency over the minds and hearts of men, 
as witnessed in the many who to-day the 
world over are returning to the Church of 
their fathers, is a grand historical proof of 



88 



CHRISTIAN UNITY: 



the doctrine of the " survival of the fittest/* 
As the smoke and dust of the long and 
bitter conflict between religious truth and 
error are clearing away, earnest souls lift 
up their eyes to recognize once more the 
fair form of Catholicism, radiant with hope 
and the crown of victory. " I have seen " 
(sings Tennyson) 

" A pine in Italy that cast its shadow 
Athwart a cataract ; firm stood the pine, 
The cataract shook the shadow. To my mind 
The cataract typed the headlong plunge and fall 
Of heresy to the pit ; the pine was ROME." 



APPENDIX. 



APPENDIX. 

THE REUNION OF CHRISTENDOM. 



Encyclical Letter, June 20, 1894.. 

The splendid tokens of public rejoicing 
which have come to Us from all sides in the 
whole course of last year, to commemorate 
Our Episcopal Jubilee, and which were lately 
crowned by the remarkable devotion of the 
Spanish nation, have afforded Us special joy, 
inasmuch as the unity of the Church and the 
admirable adhesion of her members to the Sov- 
ereign Pontiff have shone forth in this perfect 
agreement of concurring sentiments. During 
those days it seemed as if the Catholic world, 
forgetful of everything else, had centred its 
gaze and all its thoughts upon the Vatican. 

The special missions sent by kings and 
princes, the many pilgrimages, the letters We 
received so full of affectionate feeling, the 
sacred services — everything clearly brought out 
the fact that all Catholics are of one mind and 
of one heart in their veneration for the Apos- 
tolic See. And this was all the more pleasing 
and agreeable to Us, that it is entirely in con- 
91 



9 2 



APPENDIX. 



formity with Our intent and with Our en- 
deavors. For, indeed, well acquainted with 
Our times, and mindful of the duties of Our 
ministry, We have constantly sought during 
the whole course of Our Pontificate, and 
striven, as far as it was possible, by teaching 
and action, to bind every nation and people 
more closely to us, and make manifest every- 
where the salutary influence of the See of 
Rome. Therefore do we most earnestly offer 
thanks in the first place to the goodness of 
God, by Whose help and bounty We have 
been preserved to attain Our great age ; and 
then, next, to all the princes and rulers, to the 
bishops and clergy, and to as many as have 
co-operated by such repeated tokens of piety 
and reverence, to honor Our character and 
office, while affording Us personally such sea- 
sonable consolation. 

A great deal, however, has been wanting to 
the entire fulness of that consolation. Amidst 
these very manifestations of public joy and 
reverence Our thoughts went out towards the 
immense multitude of those who were strangers 
to the gladness that filled all Catholic hearts ; 
some because the3^ lie in absolute ignorance of 
the Gospel ; others because they dissent from 
the Catholic belief, though they bear the name 
of Christians. 

This thought has been, and is, a source of 



APPENDIX. 



93 



deep concern to Us ; for it is impossible to 
think of such a large portion of mankind, de- 
viating, as it were, from the right path, as they 
move away from Us, and not experience a senti- 
ment of innermost grief. 

But since We hold upon this earth the place 
of God Almighty, Who will have all men to be 
saved and to come to the knowledge of the 
truth, and now that Our advanced age and the 
bitterness of anxious cares urge' Us on towards 
the end common to every mortal, We feel 
drawn to follow the example of Our Redeemer 
and Master Jesus Christ, Who, when about to 
return to Heaven, implored of God, His 
Father, in earnest prayer, that His disciples 
and followers should be of one mind and of one 
heart : I pray . . . that they all may be one, 
as Thou Father in Me, and I in Thee : that 
they also may be one in Us. And as this Divine 
prayer and supplication does not include only 
the souls who then believed in Jesus Christ, but 
also every one of those who were henceforth to 
believe in Him, this prayer holds out to Us no 
indifferent reason for confidently expressing Our 
hopes, and for making all possible endeavors, 
in order that the men of every race and clime 
should be called and moved to embrace the 
unity of Divine faith. 

Pressed on to Our intent by charity, that 
hastens fastest there where the need is greatest, 



94 



APPENDIX. 



We direct Our first thoughts to those most un- 
fortunate of all nations who have never received 
the light of the Gospel, or who, after having 
possessed it, have lost it through neglect or the 
vicissitudes of time : hence do they ignore God, 
and live in the depths of error. Now, as all 
salvation comes from Jesus Christ— -for there is 
no other name tinder Heaven given to men where- 
by we must be saved — Our ardent desire is that 
the most holy Name of Jesus should rapidly 
pervade and fill every land. 

And here, indeed, is a duty which the 
Church, faithful to the Divine mission entrusted 
to her, has never neglected. What has been 
the object of her labors for more than nineteen 
centuries ? Is there any other work she has 
undertaken with greater zeal and constancy 
than that of bringing the nations of the earth 
to the truth and principles of Christianity? 
To-day, as ever, by Our authorit}^ the heralds 
of the Gospel constantly cross the seas to reach 
the farthest corners of the earth ; and We pray 
God daily that in His goodness He may deign 
to increase the number of His ministers who are 
really worthy of this Apostolate, and who are 
ready to sacrifice their convenience, their 
health, and their very life, if need be, in order 
to extend the frontiers of the kingdom of 
Christ. 

Do Thou, above all, O Saviour and Father 



APPENDIX. 



95 



of mankind, Christ Jesus, hasten and do not 
delay to bring about what Thou didst once 
promise to do — that when lifted up from the 
earth Thou wouldst draw all things to Thyself. 
Come then, at last, and manifest Thyself to the 
immense multitude of souls who have not felt, 
as yet, the ineffable blessings which Thou hast 
earned for men with Thy blood ; rouse those 
who are sitting in darkness, and in the shadow 
of death, that, enlightened by the rays of Thy 
wisdom and virtue, in Thee and by Thee 
"they may be made perfect in one." 

As We consider the mystery of this unity 
We see before Us all the countries which have 
long since passed, by the menr^ of God, from 
time-worn error to the wisdom of the Gospel. 
Nor could We, indeed, recall anything more 
pleasing or better calculated to extol the work 
of Divine Providence, than the memory of the 
days of yore, when the Faith that had come 
dow r n from Heaven was looked upon as the 
common inheritance of one and all ; when civil- 
ized nations, separated by distance, character, 
and habits, in spite of frequent disagreements 
and warfare on other points, were united by 
Christian faith in all that concerned religion. 
The recollection of that time causes Us to re- 
gret all the more deeply that, as the ages rolled 
by, the waves of suspicion and hatred arose, 
and great and flourishing nations were dragged 



96 



APPENDIX. 



away, in an evil hour, from the bosom of the 
Roman Church. In spite of that, however, We 
trust in the mercy of God's Almighty power, 
in Him Who alone can fix the hour of His 
benefits and Who has power to incline man's 
will as He pleases ; and We turn to those same 
nations, exhorting and beseeching them with 
fatherly love to put an end to their dissensions 
and return again to unity. 

First of all, then, We cast an affectionate 
look upon the East, from whence in the begin- 
ning came forth the salvation of the world. 
Yes, and the yearning desire of Our heart bids 
Us conceive the hope that the day is not far 
distant when the Eastern Churches, so illustri- 
ous in their ancient faith and glorious past, 
will return to the fold they have abandoned. 
We hope it, all the more, that the distance 
separating them from us is not so great : nay, 
with some few exceptions, we agree so entirely 
on other heads that, in defence of the Catholic 
faith, we often have recourse to reasons and 
testimony borrowed from the teaching, the 
rites and customs of the East. 

The principal subject of contention is the 
primacy of the Roman Pontiff. But let them 
look back to the early years of their existence, 
let them consider the sentiments entertained by 
their forefathers, and examine what the oldest 
traditions testify, and it will, indeed, become 



APPENDIX. 97 

evident to them that Christ's Divine utterance, 
Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build 
My Church, has undoubtedly been realized in 
the Roman Pontiffs. Many of these latter in 
the first ages of the Church were chosen from 
the East, and foremost among them Anacletus, 
Evaristus, Anicetus, Eleutherius, Zosimus, and 
Agatho ; and of these a great number, after 
governing the Church in wisdom and sanctity, 
consecrated their ministry with the shedding 
of their blood. The time, the reasons, the pro- 
moters of the unfortunate division are well 
known. Before the day when man separated 
what God had joined together, the name of the 
Apostolic See was held in reverence by all the 
nations of the Christian world : and the East, 
like the West, agreed without hesitation in its 
obedience to the Pontiff of Rome, as the 
legitimate successor of St. Peter, and, there- 
fore, the Vicar of Christ here on earth. 

And, accordingly, if w r e refer to the begin- 
ning of the dissension, we shall see that Photius 
himself was careful to send his advocates to 
Rome on the matters that concerned him ; and 
Pope Nicolas I. sent his legates to Constanti- 
nople from the Eternal City, without the slight- 
est opposition, "in order to examine the case 
of Ignatius the Patriarch with all diligence, 
and to bring back to the Apostolic See a full 
and accurate report " ; so that the history of 



98 APPENDIX. 

the whole negotiation is a manifest confirmation 
of the primacy of the Roman See with which 
the dissension then began. Finally, in two 
great Councils, the second of Lyons and that 
of Florence, Latins and Greeks, as is notorious, 
easily agreed, and all unanimously proclaimed 
as dogma the supreme power of the Roman 
Pontiffs. 

We have recalled these things intentionally, 
for they constitute an invitation to peace and 
reconciliation ; and with all the more reason 
that in Our own days it would seem as if there 
were a more conciliatory spirit towards Catho- 
lics on the part of the Eastern Churches, and 
even some degree of kindly feeling. To men- 
tion an instance, those sentiments were lately 
made manifest when some of Our Faithful 
travelled to the East on a holy enterprise, and 
received so many proofs of courtesy and good- 
will. 

Therefore Our mouth is open to you, to you all 
of Greek or other Oriental Rites who are sepa- 
rated from the Catholic Church. We earnestly 
desire that each and every one of you should 
meditate upon the words, so full of gravity 
and love, addressed by Bessarion to your fore- 
fathers : ' ' What answer shall we give to God 
when He comes to ask why we have separated 
from our brethren : to Him Who, to unite us 
and bring us into one fold, came down from 



APPENDIX. 



99 



heaven, was incarnate, and was crucified ? 
What will our defence be in the eyes of pos- 
terity ? Oh ! my venerable fathers, we must 
not suffer this to be, we must not entertain this 
thought, we must not thus so ill provide for 
ourselves and for our brethren.' ' 

Weigh carefully in your minds and before 
God the nature of Our request. It is not for 
any human motive, but impelled by Divine 
charity and a desire for the salvation of all, 
that We advise the reconciliation and union 
with the Church of Rome ; and We mean a 
perfect and complete union, such as could not 
subsist in any way if nothing else was brought 
about but a certain kind of agreement in the 
tenets of belief and an intercourse of fraternal 
love. The true union between Christians is 
that which Jesus Christ, the Author of the 
Church, instituted and desired, and which con- 
sists in a unity of faith and a unity of govern- 
ment. 

Nor is there any reason for you to fear on 
that account that We or any of Our successors 
will ever diminish your rights, the privileges 
of your patriarchs, or the established ritual of 
any one of your Churches. It has been and 
always will be the intent and tradition of the 
Apostolic See to make a large allowance, in til 
that is right and good, for the primitive tradi- 
tions and special customs of every nation. On 



IOO 



APPENDIX. 



the contrary, if you re-establish union with Us, 
you will see how, by God's bounty, the glory 
and dignity of your Churches will be remarka- 
bly increased. May God, then, in His good- 
ness, hear the prayer that you yourselves ad- 
dress to Him: "Make the schisms of the 
Churches cease," and "Assemble those who 
are dispersed, bring back those who err, and 
unite them to Thy Holy Catholic and Apostolic 
Church." May you thus return to that one 
holy Faith which has been handed down both 
to Us and to you from time immemorial ; which 
your forefathers preserved untainted, and which 
was enhanced by the rival splendor of the vir- 
tues, the great genius, and the sublime learn- 
ing of St. Athanasius and St. Basil, St. 
Gregory of Nazianzum and St. John Chrysos- 
tom, the two Saints who bore the name of 
Cyril, and so many other great men whose 
glory belongs as a common inheritance to the 
East and to the West. 

Suffer that We should address you more 
particularly, nations of the Slavonic race, you 
whose glorious name and deeds are attested by 
many an ancient record. You know full well 
how much the Slavs are indebted to the merits 
of St. Cyril and St. Methodius, to whose mem- 
ory We Ourselves rendered due honor only a 
few years ago. Their virtues and their labors 
were to great numbers of your race the source 



APPENDIX. 101 

of civilization and salvation. And hence the 
admirable interchange, which existed for so 
long between the Slavonic nations and the Pon- 
tiffs of Rome, of favors on the one side and of 
filial devotion on the other. If in unhappy 
times many of your forefathers were separated 
from the Faith of Rome, consider now what 
priceless benefits a return of unity would bring 
to you. The Church is anxious to welcome 
you also to her arms, that she may give you 
manifold aids to salvation, prosperity, and 
grandeur. 

With no less affection do We now look upon 
the nations who, at a more recent date, were 
separated from the Roman Church by an extra- 
ordinary revolution of things and circum- 
stances. L,et them forget the various events of 
times gone by, let them raise their thoughts far 
above all that is human, and seeking only 
truth and salvation, reflect within their hearts 
upon the Church as it was constituted by 
Christ. If they will but compare that Church 
with their own communions, and consider what 
the actual state of religion is in these, they will 
easily acknowledge that, forgetful of their early 
history, the} 7 have drifted away, on many and 
important points, into the novelty of various 
errors ; nor will they deny that of what may be 
called the patrimony of truth, which the au- 
thors of those innovations carried away with 



102 



APPENDIX. 



them in their desertion, there now scarcely re- 
mains to them any article of belief that is really 
certain and supported by authority. 

Nay, more, things have already come tp 
such a pass that many do not even hesitate to 
root up the very foundation upon which alone 
rests all religion, and the hope of men, to wit, 
the Divine Nature of Jesus Christ, our Saviour. 
And again, whereas formerly they used to as- 
sert that the books of the Old and New Testa- 
ment were written under the inspiration of 
God, they now deny them that authority : this, 
indeed, was an inevitable consequence when 
they granted to all the right of private inter- 
pretation. Hence, too, the acceptance of in- 
dividual conscience as the sole guide and rule 
of conduct, to the exclusion of any other : hence 
those conflicting opinions and numerous sects 
that fall away so often into the doctrines of 
Naturalism and Rationalism. 

Therefore is it, that having lost all hope of 
an agreement in their persuasions, they now 
proclaim and recommend a union of brotherly 
love. And rightly too, no doubt, for we should 
all be united by the bond of mutual charity. 
Our L,ord Jesus Christ enjoined it most em- 
phatically, and wished that this love of one 
another should be the mark of His disciples. 
But how can hearts be united in perfect charity 
where minds do not agree in faith? 



APPENDIX, 103 

It is on this account that many of those We 
allude to, men of sound judgment and seeking 
after truth, have looked to the Catholic Church 
for the sure way of salvation ; for they clearly 
understand that they could never be united to 
Jesus Christ as their head if they were not 
members of His body, which is the Church; 
nor really acquire the true Christian faith if 
they rejected the legitimate teaching confided 
to Peter and his successors. Such men as 
these have recognized in the Church of Rome 
the form and image of the true Church, which 
is clearly made manifest by the marks that 
God, her Author, placed upon her; and not a 
few who were possessed with penetrating judg- 
ment and a special talent for historical research, 
have shown forth in their remarkable writings 
the uninterrupted succession of the Church of 
Rome from the Apostles, the integrity of her 
doctrine, and the consistency of her rule and 
discipline. 

With the example of such men before you, 
Our heart appeals to you even more than Our 
words : to you, Our Brethren, who for three 
centuries and more differ from Us on Christian 
faith ; and to you all likewise, who in later 
times, for any reason whatsoever, have turned 
away from Us : Let 7is all meet in the unity of 
faith and oj the knowledge of the Son of God, 
Suffer that We should invite you to the unity 



io4 



APPENDIX. 



which has ever existed in the Catholic Church 
and can never fail ; suffer that We should lov- 
ingly hold out Our hand to you. The Church, 
as the common mother of all, has long been 
calling you back to her ; the Catholics of the 
world await you with brotherly love, that 
you may render holy worship to God together 
with Us, united in perfect charity by the pro- 
fession of one Gospel, one faith, and one 
hope. 

To complete the harmony of this most de- 
sired unity, it remains for Us to address all 
those throughout the world whose salvation has 
long been the object of Our thoughts and 
watchful cares ; We mean Catholics, whom the 
profeSvSion of the Roman faith, while it renders 
them obedient to the Apostolic See, preserves 
in union with Jesus Christ. There is no need 
to exhort them to true and holy unity, since 
through the Divine goodness they already pos- 
sess it ; nevertheless, they must be admonished, 
lest under pressure of the growing perils on all 
sides around them, through negligence or in- 
dolence they should lose this great blessing of 
God. For this purpose, let them take their 
rule of thought and action, as the occasion may 
require, from those instructions which at other 
times We have addressed to Catholic peoples, 
either collectively or individually ; and above 
all, let them lay down for themselves as a su- 



APPENDIX. 



105 



preme law, to yield obedience in all things to 
the teaching and authority of the Church, in no 
narrow or mistrustful spirit, but with their 
whole soul and promptitude of will. 

On this account let them consider how in- 
jurious to Christian unity is that error which 
in various forms of opinion has ofttimes ob- 
scured, nay, even destroyed the true character 
and idea of the Church. For by the will and 
ordinance of God, its Founder, it is a society 
perfect in its kind, whose office and mission it 
is to school mankind in the precepts and teach- 
ings of the Gospel, and by safeguarding the 
integrity of moral and the exercise of Christian 
virtue, to lead men to that happiness which is 
held out to every one in Heaven. And since it 
is, as w r e have said, a perfect society, therefore 
it is endowed with a living power and efficacy 
which is not derived from any external source, 
but in virtue of the ordinance of God and its 
own constitution, inherent in its very nature ; 
for the same reason it has an inborn power of 
making laws, and justice requires that in its 
exercise it should be dependent on no one ; it 
must likewise have freedom in other matters 
appertaining to its rights. 

But this freedom is not of a kind to occasion 
rivalry or envy, for the Church does not covet 
power, nor is she urged on by any selfish de- 
sire; but this one thing she does wish, this 



io6 



APPENDIX. 



only does she seek, to preserve amongst men 
the duties which virtue imposes, and by this 
means and in this way to provide for their ever- 
lasting welfare. Therefore is she wont to be 
yielding and indulgent as a mother; yea, it not 
unfrequently happens that in making large 
concessions to the exigencies of States, she re- 
frains from the exercise of her own rights, as 
the compacts often concluded with civil govern- 
ments abundantly testify. 

Nothing is more foreign to her disposition 
than to encroach on the rights of Civil power ; 
but the Civil power in its turn must respect the 
rights of the Church, and beware of arrogating 
them in any degree to itself. Now, what is the 
ruling spirit of the times when actual events 
and circumstances are taken into account ? No 
other than this : it has been the fashion to re- 
gard the Church with suspicion, to despise, 
and hate, and spitefully calumniate her; and, 
more intolerable still, men strive with might 
and main to bring her under the sway of Civil 
governments. Hence it is that her property 
has been plundered and her liberty curtailed : 
hence, again, that the training of her priest- 
hood has been beset with difficulties ; that laws 
of exceptional rigor have been passed against 
her clergy ; that Religious Orders, those ex- 
cellent safeguards of Christianity, have been 
suppressed and placed under a ban ; in a word, 



APPENDIX. 



107 



the principles and practice of the regalists have 
been renewed with increased virulence. 

Such a policy is a violation of the most 
sacred rights of the Church, and it breeds 
enormous evils to States, for the very reason 
that it is in open conflict with the purposes of 
God. When God, in His most wise provi- 
dence, placed over human society both tem- 
poral and spiritual authority, He intended them 
to remain distinct indeed, but by no means 
disconnected and at war with each other. On 
the contrary, both the will of God and the 
common weal of human society imperatively 
require that the Civil power should be in ac- 
cord with the ecclesiastical in its rule and ad- 
ministration. 

Hence the State has its own peculiar rights 
and duties, the Church likewise has hers ; but 
it is necessary that each should be united with 
the other in the bonds of concord. Thus will 
it come about that the close mutual relations 
of Church and State will be freed from the 
present turmoil, which for manifold reasons is 
ill-advised and most distressing to all well- 
disposed persons ; furthermore, it will be 
brought to pass that, without confusion or 
separation of the peculiar interests of each, the 
people will re7ider to Ccesar the things that are 
Cczsar's , and to God the things that are God's. 

There is likewise a great danger threatening 



io8 



APPENDIX. 



unity on the part of that association which goes 
by the name of the Society of Freemasons, 
whose fatal influence for a long time past op- 
presses Catholic nations in particular. Fa- 
vored by the agitations of the times, and waxing 
insolent in its power and resources and success, 
it strains every nerve to consolidate its sway 
and enlarge its sphere. It has already sallied 
forth from its hiding-places, where it hatched 
its plots, into the throng of cities, and as if to 
defy the Almighty, has set up its throne in this 
very city of Rome, the capital of the Catholic 
world. But what is most disastrous is, that 
wherever it has set its foot it penetrates into all 
ranks and departments of the commonwealth, 
in the hope of obtaining at last supreme con- 
trol. This is, indeed, a great calamity ; for its 
depraved principles and iniquitous designs are 
well known. Under the pretence of vindicat- 
ing the rights of man and of reconstituting 
society, it attacks Christianity; it rejects re- 
vealed doctrine, denounces practices of piety, 
the divine sacraments, and every sacred thing 
as superstition; it strives to eliminate the 
Christian character from marriage and the fam- 
ily and the education of youth, and from every 
form of instruction, whether public or private, 
and to root out from the minds of men all re- 
spect for authority, whether human or divine. 
On its own part, it preaches the worship of 



APPENDIX, 



109 



nature, and maintains that by the principles of 
nature are truth and probity and justice to be 
measured and regulated. In this way, as is 
quite evident, man is being driven to adopt 
customs and habits of life akin to those of the 
heathen, only more corrupt in proportion as the 
incentives to sin are more numerous. 

Although We have spoken on this subject in 
the strongest terms before, yet We are led by 
Our Apostolic watchfulness to urge it once 
more, and We repeat Our warning again and 
again, that in the face of such an eminent peril 
no precaution, howsoever great, can be looked 
upon as sufficient. May God in His mercy 
bring to naught their impious designs ; never- 
theless, let all Christians know and understand 
that the shameful yoke of Freemasonry must be 
shaken off once and for all ; and let them be 
the first to shake it off who are most galled by 
its oppression — the men of Italy and of France. 
With what weapons and by what method this 
may best be done We Ourselves have already 
pointed out : the victory cannot be doubtful to 
those who trust in that Reader Whose divine 
words still remain in all their force : / have 
overcome the world. 

Were this twofold danger averted, and gov- 
ernment and states restored to the unity, of 
faith, it is wonderful what efficacious remedies 
for evils and abundant store of benefits would 



no 



APPENDIX. 



ensue. We will touch upon the principal 
ones. 

The first regards the dignity and office of 
the Church. She would receive that honor 
which is her due, and she would go on her 
way, free from envy and strong in her liberty, 
as the minister of Gospel truth and grace, to the 
notable welfare of States. For as she has been 
given by God as a teacher and guide to the 
human race, she can contribute assistance 
which is peculiarly adapted to direct even the 
most radical transformations of time to the 
common good, to solve the most complicated 
questions, and to promote uprightness and jus- 
tice, which are the most solid foundations of the 
commonwealth . 

Moreover, there would be a marked increase 
of union among the nations, a thing most de- 
sirable to ward off the horrors of war. 

We behold the condition of Europe. For 
many years past peace has been rather an ap- 
pearance than a reality. Possessed with mu- 
tual suspicions, almost all the nations are vying 
with one another in equipping themselves with 
military armaments. Inexperienced youths are 
removed from parental direction and control, to 
be thrown amid the dangers of the soldier's 
life ; robust young men are taken from agricul- 
ture, or ennobling studies, or trade, or the arts, 
to be put under arms. Hence, the treasures of 



APPENDIX, 



in 



States are exhausted by the enormous expendi- 
ture, the national resources are frittered away, 
and private fortunes impaired ; and this, as it 
were, armed peace, which now prevails, can- 
not last much longer. Can this be the normal 
condition of human society ? Yet we cannot 
escape from this situation, and obtain true 
peace, except by the aid of Jesus Christ. For 
to repress ambition and covetousness and envy 
— the chief instigators of war — nothing is more 
fitted than the Christian virtues and, in par- 
ticular, the virtue of justice ; for, by its exer- 
cise, both the law of nations and the faith of 
treaties may be maintained inviolate, and the 
bonds of brotherhood continue unbroken, if 
men are but convinced that justice exalteth a 
nation. 

As in its external relations, so in the internal 
life of the State itself, the Christian virtues will 
provide a guarantee of the common weal much 
more sure and stronger far than any which laws 
or armies can afford. For there is no one who 
does not see that the dangers to public se- 
curity and order are daily on the increase, since 
seditious societies continue to conspire for the 
overthrow and ruin of States, as the frequency 
of their atrocious outrages testifies. 

There are two questions, forsooth — the one 
called the social^ the other the political ques- 
tion — which are discussed with the greatest 



112 



APPENDIX. 



vehemence. Both of them, without doubt, are 
of the last importance, and, though praise- 
worthy efforts have been put forth, in studies, 
and measures, and experiments, for their wise 
and just solution, yet nothing could contribute 
more to this purpose than that the minds of 
men in general should be imbued with right 
sentiments of duty from the internal principle 
of Christian faith. We treated expressly of 
the social question, in this sense, a short time 
ago, from the stand-point of principles drawn 
from the Gospel and natural reason. 

As regards the political question, which 
aims at reconciling liberty with authority — two 
things which many confound in theory, and 
separate too widely in practice — most efficient 
aid may be derived from Christian philosophy. 
For, when this point has been settled and 
recognized by common agreement, that whatso- 
ever the form of government the authority is 
from God, reason at once perceives that in some 
there is a legitimate right to command, in 
others the corresponding duty to obey, and that 
without prejudice to their dignity, since obedi- 
ence is rendered to God rather than to man ; 
and God has denounced the most rigorous 
judgment against those in authority, if they 
fail to represent Him with uprightness and jus- 
tice. Then the .liberty of the individual can 
afford ground of suspicion or envy to no one ; 



APPENDIX. 



since, without injury to any, his conduct will 
be guided by truth and rectitude and whatever 
is allied to public order. Lastly, if it be con- 
sidered what influence is possessed by the 
Church, the mother of and peacemaker between 
rulers and peoples, whose mission it is to help 
them both with her authority and counsel, then 
it will be most manifest how much it concerns 
the common weal that all nations should resolve 
to unite in the same belief and the same pro- 
fession of the Christian faith. 

With these thoughts in Our mind and ar- 
dent yearnings in Our heart, We see from afar 
what would be the new order of things that 
would arise upon the earth, and nothing could 
be sweeter to Us than the contemplation of the 
benefits that would flow from it. It can hardly 
be imagined what immediate and rapid pro- 
gress would be made all over the earth, in all 
manner of greatness and prosperity, w r ith the 
establishment of tranquillity and peace, the 
promotion of studies, the founding and the 
multiplying on Christian lines, according to our 
directions, of associations for the cultivators of 
the soil, for workmen and tradesmen, through 
whose agency rapacious usury would be put 
down, and a large field opened up for useful 
labors. 

And these abundant benefits would not be 
confined within the limits of civilized nations, 



ii4 



APPENDIX, 



but, like an overcharged river, would flow far 
and wide. It must be remembered, as We ob- 
served at the outset, that an immense number 
of races have been waiting, all through the long 
ages, to receive the light of truth and civiliza- 
tion. Most certainly, the counsels of God with 
regard to the eternal salvation of peoples are 
far removed above the understanding of man ; 
yet if miserable superstition still prevails in so 
many parts of the world, the blame must be 
attributed in no small measure to religious dis- 
sensions. For, as far as it is given to human 
reason to judge from the nature of events, this 
seems without doubt to be the mission assigned 
by God to Europe, to go on by degrees, carry- 
ing Christian civilization to every portion of the 
earth. The beginnings and first growth of this 
great work, which sprang from the labors of 
former centuries, were rapidly receiving large 
development, when all of a sudden the discord 
of the sixteenth century broke out. Christen- 
dom was torn with quarrels and dissensions, 
Europe exhausted with contests and wars, and 
the sacred missions felt the baneful influence of 
the times. While the causes of dissension still 
remain, what wonder is it that so large a por- 
tion of mankind is held enthralled with bar- 
barous customs and insane rites ? 

L,et us one and all, then, for the sake of the 
common welfare, labor with equal assiduity to 



APPENDIX. 



US 



restore the ancient concord. In order to bring 
about this concord, and spread abroad the bene- 
fits of the Christian revelation, the present is 
the most seasonable time ; for never before 
have the sentiments of human brotherhood pen- 
etrated so deeply into the souls of men, and 
never in any age has man been seen to seek out 
his fellow-men more eagerly, in order to know 
them better and to help them. Immense tracts 
of land and sea are traversed with incredible 
rapidity, and thus extraordinary advantages 
are afforded, not only for commerce and scien- 
tific investigations, but also for the propagation 
of the word of God from the rising of the sun 
to the going down of the same. 

We are well aware of the long labors in- 
volved in the restoration of that order of things 
which We desire ; and it may be that there are 
those who consider that We are far too san- 
guine, and look for things that are rather to be 
wished for than expected. But We unhesitat- 
ingly place all Our hope and confidence in the 
Saviour of mankind, Jesus Christ, well remem- 
bering what great things have been achieved in 
times past by the folly of the Cross and its 
preaching, to the astonishment and confusion 
of the wisdom of the world. We beg of princes 
and rulers of States, appealing to their states- 
manship and earnest solicitude for the people, 
to weigh Our counsels in the balance of truth 



n6 APPENDIX. 

and second them with their authority and 
favor. If only a portion of the looked-for re- 
sults should come about, it will cause no in- 
considerable boon in the general decadence, 
when the intolerable evils of the present day 
bring with them the dread of further evils in 
days to come. 

The last years of the past century left Eu- 
rope worn out with disasters, and panic-stricken 
with the turmoils of revolution. And why 
should not our present century, which is now 
hastening to its close, by a reversion of circum- 
stances bequeath to mankind the pledges of 
concord, with the prospects of the great bene- 
fits which are bound up in the unity of the 
Christian faith ? 

May God, Who is rich in mercy , and in 
Whose power are the times and moi?tents, grant 
Our wishes and desires, and in His great good- 
ness hasten the fulfilment of that divine prom- 
ise of Jesus Christ : There will be one Fold and 
o?ie Shepherd. 



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